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A  GIFT  OF  NAPOLEON 

BEING  A  SEQUEL  TO  LETTERS  OF 
CAPTAIN  ENGELBERT  LUTYENS,  ORDERLY 
OFFICER  AT  LONGWOOD,  SAINT  HELENA, 
FEB.   1820  TO   NOV.    1823      :      :      EDITED   BY 

SIR    LEES    KNOWLES 

BARONET,    C.V.O.,    O.B.E.,    T.D.,    D.L.,    M.A.,    LL.M. 


WITH    ILLUSTRATIONS. 


LONDON—JOHN    LANE,    THE    BODLEY    HEAD 
NEW  YORK— JOHN  LANE  COMPANY,  MCMXXI 


.'  si  i'^  »  if  '  •  >'     ••'•-•     - 


Printed  by  Tillotsons  (Bolton),  Ltd., 
Mealhouse  Lane,   Bolton. 


PREFACE 


Not  all  the  water  in  the  rough,   rude  sea 
Can  wash  the  balm  off  an  anointed  king  ; 
The  breath  of  worldly  men  cannot  depose 
The  deputy  elected  by  the  Lord  "  : 

Shakespeare. — Richard  II.  Act  Hi.  Scene  2. 


THIS  BOOK  IS  DEDICATED  TO 

THE  XX.  REGIMENT  OF  FOOT,  NOW  THE  LANCASHIRE  FUSILIERS, 

AND  TO  ALL  STUDENTS  OF  NAPOLEONIC  HISTORY  ! 

Napoleon  the  First  died  on  May  5th,  1821,  aged  51  years,  and 
Eugenie,  the  widow  of  Napoleon  the  Third,  died  on  July  12th,  1920, 
aged  95  years,  the  former  a  prisoner,  the  latter  a  guest,  of  Great  Britain  : 
and  thus,  the  connection  between  the  First  and  Second  Napoleonic 
Empires  has  come  to  an  end  within  a  period  of  one  hundred  years, 
and  it  seems  fitting  that  there  should  be  reference  to  the  history,  and  of 
its  makers,  touching  that  period.  That  is  some  excuse  for  the  production 
of  this  book,  with  a  preface  and  an  index,  the  former  introducing  the 
reader  to  the  subject,  like  an  avenue  with  its  vista,  and  the  latter 
pointing  out  the  entrances,  the  exits,  and  the  objects  of  interest,  or  the 
reverse.  Except  for  these  few  lines,  I  would  ask  my  readers  to  accept 
as  the  substantial  preface  the  "  Letters  of  Captain  Engelbert  Lutyens  "^, 
a  book  which  has  been  well  received. 

It  has  been  said  that  a  compiler  is  liable  to  a  hard  fate,  and  that  his 
labours  are  not  infrequently  used  without  adequate  acknowledgment  : 
yet,  in  recognising  him,  his  authorities  themselves  may  not  be  recognised. 
I  would  not  willingly  do  injustice  to  anyone  :  so,  I  have  tried  to  make 
due  acknowledgments  in  my  text.  A  critic,  too,  may  do  injustice  by 
fault-finding,  in  order  to  parade  his  own  knowledge,  or,  by  withholding 
due  praise,  lest  he  should  appear  to  be  obtuse  :   thus,  it  happens,  that  a 

*  "  Letters  of  Captain  Engelbert  Lutyens",  Orderly  Officer  at  Longwood,  St.  Helena, 
February,  1820  to  November,  1823.  Published  by  John  Lane,  The  Bodley  Head,  London, 
and  John  Lane  Company,  New  York. 


4957  35 


PREFACE 

pin-prick,  or,  to  use  an  old  phrase,  a  privy  nip,  may  counterbalance 
all  that  is  of  value.  I  ask  for  kind  consideration.  I  know  that  this  book 
is  of  little  literary  importance  :  but,  I  offer  it  on  the  centenary  of  his 
death,  in  homage  to  the  memory  of  a  great  man,  and  with  the  intention 
of  filling  up  a  gap,  however  small,  in  the  history  of  his  life — a  trifling 
addition  to  the  immense  mass  of  the  literature  of  Napoleon,  who 
maintains  his  hold,  even  now,  upon  British  imagination. 

Hitherto,  there  has  been  little  known  of  Marchand  and  St.  Denis, 
two  of  the  so-called  lesser  exiles  of  St.  Helena.  Here,  I  have  given  an 
outline  of  their  lives,  their  portraits,  and  specimens  of  their  hand- 
writing. At  the  same  time,  I  hope  that  I  have  proved,  inter  alia,  that  the 
lists  from  the  will  of  Napoleon,  etc.,  deposited  in  the  British  Museum, 
are  in  the  handwriting  of  St.  Denis,  and  that  it  was  St.  Denis  who 
inscribed  "  L'Empereur  Napoleon  ",  with  its  far-reaching  consequences, 
in  the  three  volumes  of  Coxe's  Life  of  Marlborough,  a  gift  of  Napoleon, 
an  unique  gift,  from  his  death-bed,  to  the  officers  of  the  XX.  Regiment, 
now  the  Lancashire  Fusiliers. 

As  regards  the  portraits,  I  have  had  reproductions  made  from  the 
group  of  exiles  in  the  well-known  picture  of  "  the  death  of  Napoleon  " 
by  Steuben.  Marchand  on  the  left,  and  St.  Denis  on  the  right,  are 
gazing  upon  their  dying  master  :  and,  on  the  wall,  hangs  a  portrait  of 
Napoleon's  only  son.  Napoleon  the  Second,  created  King  of  Rome,  and 
best  known  by  his  Austrian  title  of  Due  de  Reichstadt. 

There  is  a  portrait  of  Marchand  in  "  Apr^s  la  mort  de  I'Empereur  ", 
by  Alb^ric  Cahuet,  facing  page  60,  and,  as  stated,  another  of  him,  with 
St.  Denis,  in  the  Steuben  picture.  I  possess  a  beautiful  oleograph  copy 
of  that  picture,  which  is  reproduced  by  Fr^d^ric  Masson  in  "  Napoleon  st 
Sainte-H^l^ne  ",  Volume  II,  facing  page  222,  and  by  Norwood  Young 
in  "  Napoleon  in  Exile  ",  volume  II,  facing  page  220.  It  was  reproduced 
also  in  the  Connoisseur  for  May,  1915,  page  46  :  and,  there  is  an 
engraving  of  it  by  Henry  Wolf,  in  the  fourth  volume  of  Sloane's  Life  of 
Napoleon  Bonaparte  (New  York,  Century  Co.,  1906).  The  dimensions 
of  my  copy,  inside  the  frame,  are  3  feet  2  inches  by  2  feet  7  inches. 
On  the  key,  written  in  pencil,  apparently  in  foreign  handwriting,  is  the 
statement  "  Le  tableau  appartenu  a  la  Princesse  Murat  d^c6d6e  k 
Londres,  puis  elle  I'a  donn6  k  Lady  Norfolk":  and,  printed  in  French, 
"  The  night  of  4th  and  5th  of  May  had  been  very  disturbed,  by  an  almost 
continuous  delirium.  The  last  articulate  words  that  we  could  dis- 
tinguish were  *  France,  Arm^e '  :  the  Emperor  became  silent.  At 
four  o'clock  in  the  morning,  calm  followed  this  state  of  restlessness:  the 
calm  of  courage  and  of  resignation.     The  eye  of  the  Emperor  is  fixed, 


PREFACE 

his  mouth  compressed  :  some  drops  of  sugar  and  water  are  inserted. 
Little  by  little  the  pulse  slows  down,  a  sigh  escapes  from  the  noble 
breast,  hope  revives  in  us.  At  eight  o'clock,  the  French  employed  in 
the  service  of  the  Emperor  enter  the  room,  restraining  their  grief  which 
is  overbearing.  Their  feelings  chilled  by  the  silence  of  death,  they 
arranged  themselves  near  the  bed  which  already  we  were  surrounding. 
Our  eyes  fixed  on  the  noble  head  of  the  Emperor  turn  away  only  to 
try  to  read  in  the  eyes  of  Dr.  Antommarchi,  if  any  hope  at  all  remained. 
It  is  in  vain  :  pitiless  death  is  there. 

"  At  half -past  five  in  the  evening  the  gun  for  retreat  sounds.  The 
sun,  sinking  in  floods  of  light,  ceases  to  shine  the  moment  the  brilliant 
star  which  dominated  the  world  begins  to  surround  itself  in  immortal 
glory.  The  anxiety  of  the  doctor  redoubles.  The  hand  which  led  to 
victory,  and  of  which  he  takes  the  beats,  is  becoming  chilled  by  death. 
Dr.    Arnott   counts  the  intervals  between   one  breath   and   another  : 

fifteen  seconds,  then  thirty  seconds,  then  sixty  seconds,  pass the 

Emperor  is  gone. 

"  His  lips  are  discoloured,  the  mouth  is  slightly  contracted,  the  eye- 
lids are  rigid,  the  eyes  are  turned  down,  the  expression  is  calm  and 
suggestive  of  peace.  At  once,  our  sobs  burst  forth,  with  all  the  more 
force  on  account  of  their  long  suppression.  The  children  of  Madame 
Bertrand  had  come  in  at  ten  o'clock  :  they  were  recalled  by  their  mother, 
who  wished  them  to  kiss  the  cold  hand,  which  for  six  years  had  lavished 
caresses  upon  them.  The  scene  of  bereavement,  which  appeared  before 
them,  prevented  them  from  bearing  such  dreadful  agitation  for  any 
length  of  time.  The  eldest  boy  fainted,  and  it  was  necessary  to  remove 
him  from  this  scene  of  sorrow.  During  this  interval.  Captain  Crokat, 
with  Dr.  Arnott,  entered,  to  verify  the  time  of  the  death  of  the  Emperor, 
this  proceeding  affecting  his  feelings.  He  withdraws  with  respect,  and 
appears  to  offer  excuses  for  having  disturbed  us  in  our  grief.  Shortly 
afterwards,  two  English  doctors  follow  him,  place  their  hands  on  the 
heart  of  the  victim,  and  depart  coldly,  to  certify  the  evidence  of  the 
officer. 

"  Thus,  the  Emperor  Napoleon  passed  away,  surrounded  by  his 
faithful  servants,  but  not  by  those  natural  objects  of  affection  which  a 
man  would  look  for  in  his  last  moments,  a  mother,  a  wife,  a  son." 
(Extract  from  the  unpublished  souvenirs  of  M.  Marchand,  Ist  Valet 
de  chambre  of  the  Emperor.) 

Fr^d^ric  Masson  states  that  the  original  picture  was  painted  with  the 
approval  of  the  companions  of  the  Emperor,  and  that  their  portraits 
in  it  are  from  life.     The  face  of  Napoleon  was  reproduced  probably 


PREFACE 

from  the  celebrated  death-mask,  as  I  can  find  no  trace  of  an  ear. 
According  to  Petit  Larousse  illustr^,  Charles  Baron  de  Steuben 
was  a  German  historical-painter,  born  at  Bauerbach,  Baden, 
in  1788,  and  he  died  in  1856.  In  answer  to  my  inquiries  about  him, 
correspondents  of  "  Notes  &  Queries  "  for  September  4th  and  25th, 
1920,  kindly  supplied  the  further  information,  that  he  was  the  son  of  a 
lieutenant-colonel  in  the  Russian  army,  and  that,  after  studying  at  the 
St.  Petersburg  Academy,  he  went  to  Paris,  where  he  became  a  pupil  of 
Gerard,  Robert  Lefevre,  and  Prud'hon.  First  brought  into  the  public 
eye  by  his  painting  of  "  Peter  the  Great  on  the  Lake  of  Ladoga  during 
a  tempest  ",  he  subsequently  obtained  the  cross  of  the  Legion  of  Honour, 
and  a  Barony.  He  revisited  Russia  during  his  declining  years,  but 
returned  to  Paris  where  he  died.  Other  Napoleonic  subjects  painted 
by  him  were,  "  The  Return  from  Elba  ",  "  Napoleon  at  Waterloo  ", 
and  "  Napoleon  dictating  his  Memoirs  to  General  Gourgaud  "  :  and, 
he  painted  many  portraits  of  the  Emperor's  nobility.  Moreover, 
he  was  an  assiduous  antiquary.  In  "  Napoleon  in  Exile  ",  mentioned 
above,  volume  I.,  facing  page  18,  is  a  picture  entitled  "  Napoleon's 
reception  by  the  7th  Regiment  at  Grenoble  "  from  a  print  by  Jazet, 
after   Steuben. 

Mr.  Andrew  de  Ternant,  whose  family  dropped,  after  the  French 
Revolution,  the  titles  of  Baron  et  Comte  de  Ternant  et  de  la  Motte, 
informs  me,  that  Charles  Baron  de  Steuben  was  a  protege  of  Stephanie 
de  Beauharnais,  Grand  Duchess  of  Baden,  and  that  he  went  to  Paris 
about  the  year  1807.  His  title  of  Baron  was  a  Napoleonic  creation. 
He  left  Paris  after  Napoleon's  first  abdication,  and  did  not  return  until 
1831.  His  picture  of  the  "  Death  of  Napoleon  "  was  frequently  engraved 
in  Paris  from  1831  to  1835,  and  it  was  given  in  a  "  supplement " 
in  some  French  journals  of  the  period.  He  was  in  Florence  from  1823-25, 
during  which  time  he  was  patronised  by  Madame  Mere  (Napoleon's 
mother).  This  is  probably  the  period  of  the  picture,  for  it  was  executed 
in  Italy  at  the  expense  of  Madame  M^re.  The  original  was  on  view  at 
a  Parisian  picture-dealer's  exhibition  during  the  Spring  of  1835,  and  it 
may  be  now  in  some  collection  in  France.  Mr.  de  Ternant  says  that  his 
maternal  grandmother,  who  passed  away  in  her  sleep  in  the  winter  of 
1914  just  a  few  weeks  before  reaching  her  100th  birthday,  had  a  framed 
copy  of  the  oleograph"  in  her  bedroom  :  it  was  presented  by  Baron  de 
Steuben  to  her  father,  the  brother  of  the  great-grandfather  of  the 
victorious  General  Weygand.  The  first  impression  was  limited  to 
twenty  copies,  and  all,  with  the  exception  of  three  for  the  artist,  were 


PREFACE 

reserved  strictly  for  relatives  and  connections  by  marriage  of  the  dead 
Emperor. 

I  was  unable  to  obtain  help  from  the  posthumous  memoirs 
of  Princess  Caroline  Murat  as  to  the  French  inscription,  to  the 
effect  that  a  Princess  Murat  on  her  death  had  given  my  picture 
to  a  member  of  the  Norfolk  family.  Mr.  de  Ternant,  however, 
has  sent  me  the  following  note  :  "  The  Princess  Murat — Caroline — you 
are  in  search  of,  according  to  the  Almanach  de  Gotha,  1883,  page  301-2, 
was  a  Scottish  lady,  n^e  Fraser,  born  April  13th,  1810,  died  February 
10th,  1879.  She  was  the  daughter-in-law  of  Napoleon's  sister.  The 
"  Lady  Norfolk  "  was  probably  a  former  Duchess  of  Norfolk — Augusta, 
daughter  of  the  first  Lord  Lyons — and  mother  of  the  late  Duke.  Miss 
Fraser,  if  not  originally  a  Roman  Catholic,  must  have  become  one  to  have 
married  into  the  Murat  family,  of  which  the  first  Lord  Lyons  was  a  great 
friend  ". 

My  copy  of  the  picture  was  presented,  according  to  Messrs.  Christie, 
Manson  &  Woods,  by  Millicent,  Duchess  of  Sutherland,  to  their  Red 
Cross  Sale  of  April  16th,  1915  :  but,  it  has  escaped  her  memory.  It  was 
bought  by  Mr.  James  McLean,  re-presented  and  sold,  and  I  bought  it 
at  the  Red  Cross  Sale  held  by  the  same  Auctioneers  on  April  15th,  1916. 
I  think,  now,  that  I  have  discovered  the  Princess  Murat  who  died  in 
London,  and  the  member  of  the  Norfolk  family  to  whom  she  gave  the 
copy.  It  is  probably  safe  to  say  that  Comte  Bertrand  first  suggested  the 
original  painting  to  Baron  de  Steuben,  and  that  he  and  Dr.  O'Meara 
corrected  the  grouping  of  the  figures  in  the  first  rough  sketch. 

LEES   KNOWLES. 


Westwood,  Pendlebury, 

and 

Turton   Tower,  Bolton, 

Lancashire, 

1921. 


CONTENTS 

Page 

Chapter      I.    A  Gift  of  Napoleon 1 

Chapter    II.    Inscription  of  the  Gift      ...  10 

Chapter  III.    Correspondence 19 

Chapter   IV.    Marchand  and  St.  Denis    ...  34 

Chapter     V.    Marlbrough  s'en  va-t-en  guerre  45 

Chapter  VI.    Marshal  Soult 54 


ILLUSTRATIONS 


FACING 
PAGE 

Mabchand  and  St.  Denis        Frontispiece 

The     three     volumes     op     the      Life      op    John,    Duke    op 

Marlborough,  by  William  Coxe         4 

Title  Page  with  the  Inscription  "l'Empereur  Napoleon"    ..     ..      8 

Lists  Nos.  2  and  3,  British  Museum,  Foreign  Letters,  Vol.  15,729, 

Folio  132,  in  the  handwriting  of  St.  Denis    18 

Bibliotheque  Nationale — Letter  op  Marchand 22 

Book  inscribed  by  Marchand      23 

Book  inscribed  by  St.  Denis       24 

Autograph  of  St.  Denis 26 

A  Page  prom  the  Will  op  St.  Denis        30 

The  last  Page  with  the  Signature 32 

Letter  op  Marchand  to  a  Brother  of  Napoleon      38 


A  GIFT  OF  NAPOLEON 


A   GIFT  OF  NAPOLEON 


CHAPTER  I. 

NAPOLEON  was  the  most  powerful  man  of  his  time  ;  but,  from 
the  day  that  he  set  foot  upon  St.  Helena,  his  power  was  rapidly 
on  the  wane.  Disease  had  marked  him — worn  out  in  mind 
and  body — for  her  own.  He  had  been  deserted  by  his  friends,  not  only  by 
those  who  had  sat  with  him  at  his  table  and  partaken  of  his  munificence, 
but  also  by  those  who  had  gathered  up  even  the  crumbs.  The  keen 
tooth  of  ingratitude  had  entered  into  his  soul,  like  the  cancer  which  was 
gnawing  at  his  body.  The  human  rats  had  left  the  sinking  ship — a  sign 
of  the  abandonment  of  hope — and  showed  no  sign  of  an  intention  to 
return.  His  wife  was  living  apart  from  him,  forgetful,  and  more  than 
forgetful,  of  the  love  of  her  husband,  and  of  their  child,  his  son  and  heir, 
who  was  at  a  strange  court,  kept  there  in  ignorance  so  far  as  possible, 
even  of  his  parentage,  and  of  his  proper  place  in  the  world.  Only  one 
woman  stayed  till  the  bitter  end,  and  she  was  by  birth  not  a  French,  but 
a  British,  subject.  Yet,  in  the  little  group  of  exiles,  there  were  those  who 
were  faithful,  and  in  those  few,  two  of  the  humblest — call  them  two  of 
the  lesser  exiles,  if  you  will — were  faithful  to  the  end.  Better  to  have 
no  friends  than  false  friends,  better  no  friend  than  one  who  fawns  upon 
you  in  prosperity,  and  turns  his  back  upon  you  in  adversity  !  So,  in  the 
life  of  Napoleon.  Marchand  and  St.  Denis  stand  out  as  conspicuous 
illustrations  of  fidelity. 

Marchand  was  the  first  valet,  and  St.  Denis  was  the  second  valet 
and  custodian  of  the  library.  It  was  Marchand  who  received  the  last 
instructions  of  Napoleon  :  it  was  he  who  was  the  chosen  bearer  of  his 
keepsakes.  In  his  hands  were  placed  the  keys,  to  his  keeping  was  entrusted 
the  will  :  and  Marchand,  the  first  valet  of  the  exile,  was  appointed 
one  of  the  executors  of  the  Emperor. 

Hear  the  last  story,  as  told,  in  effect,  by  Monsieur  Frederic  Masson  ! 
No  one  had  informed  Napoleon  that  the  doctors  in  consultation  had  decided 
to  give  him  calomel,  a  preparation  of  mercury,  because  everyone  knew  his 


A   OrFT   OF    NAPOLEON 

aversion  *c  f^U  attempted  remedies,  and  it  was  agreed  not  to  tell  him. 
Marchand  strove  with  them,  not  willing  to  deceive  his  master  :  but, 
at  last,  he  yielded,  and  then  only  on  account  of  the  remark  of  Count 
Bertrand,  the  Grand  Marshal,  "  it  is  this,  either  the  trial  of  a  last  possible 
resource,  or  the  loss  of  the  Emperor.  We  must  not  leave  it  as  a 
reproach  to  ourselves  that  we  have  not  done  everything  that,  humanly 
speaking,  could  have  been  done  to  save  him".  So,  dissolving  the  powder 
in  water  and  sugar  (eau  sucr^e),  Marchand  presents  the  glass  to  the 
Emperor,  who  swallows  the  contents  with  difl&culty,  tries  to  throw  up  the 
mouthful  which  he  has  taken,  and,  then,  turning  toward  Marchand,  he 
says,  in  a  reproachful  voice,  full  of  affection  impossible  to  describe,  and 
addressing  him  in  the  French  second  person  singular,  the  "  thou  "  of 
friendship  next  to  the  "  I  "  of  self,  so  difficult  to  translate  into  English, 
"  and  thou  too,  deceivest  me  !  "  How  vividly  this  recalls  the  recorded 
dying  words  of  Caesar,  when  stabbed  by  Marcus  Brutus,  his  own  familiar 
friend,  "  et  tu  Brute  !  "  Marchand,  beside  himself,  goes  out,  and  he  does 
not  return  for  a  time,  and  then,  only  when,  half  an  hour  later,  the  Emperor 
asks  again  for  something  to  drink,  and,  taking  with  trust  a  little  water 
and  sugar,  he  says,  "  It  is  good,  it  is  very  good  ". 

That  man  is  the  nobler  who  accepts  misfortune,  rather  than  fortune, 
with  a  smile  :  one  who  does  not  repine,  although  injustice  may  allow 
no  chance  of  defence.  Nothing  is  harder  to  bear  than  a  sense  of  injustice 
that  finds  no  vent  for  expression  !  There  is  no  doubt  that  Napoleon 
suffered  in  silence,  and  that  his  pain  was  greater  in  mind  than  in  body  : 
but,  he  refused  to  show  his  emotion  in  public.  A  brave  man  never 
proclaims  the  misery  of  his  soul,  his  honour  and  his  dignity  forbid  it. 
The  body  can  be  crushed,  but  not  the  soul  :  and,  it  is  in  that  fact  that 
the  superman  feels  his  strength.  The  fallen  mighty,  the  lion  at  bay, 
surrounded  by  a  pack  of  snarling,  snapping,  cowardly  curs,  maintains 
his  dignity,  and,  in  his  death.  Napoleon  showed  the  dignity  of  dying 
greatness  to  the  puny  littleness  of  a  staring  and  a  gaping  world. 

Since  the  Letters  of  Captain  Engelbert  Lutyens,  Orderly  Officer  at 
Longwood,  St.  Helena,  were  published,  I  have  been  able  to  obtain  some 
further  information  of  interest  in  connection  with  them.  Those  letters 
were  official  reports  in  which  it  was  the  duty  of  their  writer  to  detail 
all  events,  however  trivial,  which  came  under  his  notice  ;  and,  although 
they  may  contain  little,  or  nothing,  of  historical  importance,  yet  by  their 
homeliness,  they  enable  the  reader  to  form  a  good  idea  of  the  life  of 
Napoleon,  and  they  show,  like  the  proverbial  straw,  the  way  the  wind 
blew  at  Longwood,  in  portraying  the  daily  routine  during  the  last  few 
months  of  the  Emperor's  life.     Their  historical  sidelights  may  be  mere 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

flickers,  but  they  have  afforded  some  illumination  for  appreciative  readers. 
Lutyens  received  his  appointment  as  Orderly  Officer  at  Longwood  on 
February  10th,  1820,  and  he  resigned  it  on  April  15th,  1821,  about  three 
weeks  before  the  death  of  Napoleon,  which  occurred  on  Saturday,  May 
5th,  1821.  His  work  as  Orderly  Officer  was  much  more  onerous  than 
that  of  any  of  his  predecessors,  for,  at  that  time,  illness  induced  Napoleon 
to  live  in  greater  seclusion,  the  chief  reasons  for  it  being  largely  the 
resentment  of  Napoleon  due  to  the  harsh  restrictions  with  which  he  was 
hedged  about  by  the  pedantry  and  stupidity  of  the  Governor,  Sir 
Hudson  Lowe,  and  to  the  refusal  of  the  British  Government  to  accede 
to  his  claim  that  it  was  his  right  to  use,  and  to  be  addressed  by,  the 
title  of  Emperor.  The  episode  in  the  life  of  Captain  Lutyens  of  especial 
importance  was  his  removal  by  the  Governor  on  account  of  two 
differences,  which  might  easily  have  been  adjusted,  namely,  a  dispute 
with  a  superior  officer,  and  the  acceptance  from  Napoleon  of  books 
inscribed  with  the  title  of  Emperor.  The  books  contained  the  dedication 
"  L'Empereur  Napoleon",  but  not  in  Napoleon's  handwriting,  and 
Lowe  ordered  Lutyens  to  return  them,  and  to  pretend  that  he  did  not 
know  how,  or  why,  they  came  into  his  possession.  The  consequences 
of  the  gift,  related  fully  in  the  "  Letters  of  Captain  Engelbert  Lutyens", 
is  a  sad  story,  and  Sir  Hudson  Lowe  comes  out  of  it  badly,  for,  as  a 
writer  in  the  "  Athenaeum  "  justly  remarked,  he  appears  as  a  mean 
and  suspicious  martinet,  who  behaved  to  Lutyens,  his  victim,  with 
great  want  of  candour.  It  was  cruel  fortune  for  Lutyens  that,  by  his 
dismissal,  he  lost  promotion,  a  trip  to  England,  and  the  reward  of  £500 
for  carrying  the  dispatches  announcing  the  Emperor's  death,  which  duty 
devolved  upon  Captain  William  Crokat,  also  of  the  XX.  Regiment  of 
Foot,  who  succeeded  Lutyens  for  about  three  weeks,  from  April  15th 
to  May  7th,  1821,  including  the  final  week  of  Napoleon's  life. 

At  the  time  that  the  "  Letters  of  Captain  Engelbert  Lutyens  "  were 
published,  the  volumes  of  Coxe's  "  Life  of  Marlborough  "  were  not 
available.  The  plate,  and  other  objects  of  value,  of  the  Officers'  Mess 
of  the  1st  Battalion  of  the  Lancashire  Fusiliers,  formerly  the  XX.  Regiment 
of  Foot,  had  been  placed  in  storage,  in  view  of  active  service  in  the 
great  war  ;  and,  it  was  only  when  some  of  the  surviving  officers  returned 
home  on  leave  that  the  books  could  be  found.  Thanks  to  their  kindness, 
and  my  thanks  are  especially  due  to  Air-Commodore  L.  E.  0.  Charlton, 
C.B.,  C.M.G.,  D.S.O.,  Lt.-Colonel  S.  F.  McI.  Lomer,  O.B.E.,  Lt.-Colonel 
H.  V.  S.  Ormond,  Lt.-Colonel  C.  de  Putron,  Major  B.  Smyth,  O.B.E., 
M.V.O.,  and  Major  R.  R.  Willis,  V.C.,  I  have  been  permitted  to  examine 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

again  those  books  thoroughly,  and  I  am  able  to  give  further  information 
about  them. 

For  the  sake  of  clearness,  there  are  quoted  here  the  following 
letters,  written  by  the  Orderly  Officer  at  Longwood  to  Major  Gideon 
Gorrequer  (1781-1841),  the  Aide-de-Camp  and  Acting  Military- 
Secretary  to  Sir  Hudson  Lowe,  the  Governor,  telling  how  the  book, 
Coxe's  "  Life  of  Marlborough  ",  was  given  to  the  XX  Regiment. 

,    Longwood,  15th  April,  1821. 
Sir, 

Yesterday  evening,  during  the  time  I  was  with  the  Governor, 
a  servant  of  the  Establishment  left  in  my  apartments  Coxe's  "Life  of  the 
Duke  of  Marlborough  ",  the  meaning  of  which  I  did  not  und^stand 
until  I  saw  Doctor  Arnott,  after  he  came  from  visiting  General  Bonaparte, 
who  informed  me  General  Bonaparte  had  been  talking  about  English 
soldiers,  and  all  of  a  sudden  he  said  he  would  make  the  Library  of  the 
20th  Regiment  a  present  of  the  History  of  the  Duke  of  Marlborough, 
one  of  the  best  English  Generals,  and  immediately  ordered  Marchand 
to  get  it,  and  then  ordered  it  to  be  brought  to  me^. 

Doctor  Arnott  has  just  come  from  General  Bonaparte,  who,  he 
thinks,  is  a  little  better  this  morning. 

I  remain,  Sir, 

Yours  truly, 

E.  Lutyens. 
To  Major  Gorrequer,  etc.,  etc.,  etc. 

P.S. — I  shall  keep  the  books  until  I  hear  from  you.  The  subject 
of  the  books  is  only  known  to  Arnott  and  myself. 

E.  L. 

Pencil  note. — Mem  :  in  the  margin. 

Doctor  Arnott,  who  brought  the  above  note  from  Captain  Lutyens, 
was  desired  to  tell  him  to  send  the  books  to  Plantation  House,  for  the 
Governor  to  look  at. 


'  The  result  of  the  presentation  of  Coxe's  "Life  of  Marlborough",  by  Napoleon  to 
the  officers  of  the  20th  Regiment,  was  the  removal  from  duty  at  Longwood  of  Captain 
Engelbert  Lutyens. 


u 


o 

o 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

Longwood,  15th  April,  1821. 
Sir, 

Countess  Bertrand  *  *  *  *  mentioned  she  had  heard  that 
General  Bonaparte  had  given  to  the  20th  Library  the  "  Life  of  the  Duke 
of  Marlborough",  the  whole  of  which  the  General  now  had  translated 
into  French^  by  Count  Bertrand. 

Doctor  Arnott  was  with  General  Bonaparte  last  evening.  He 
found  him  much  the  same  as  in  the  morning.  He  asked  the  Doctor 
how  the  Officers  liked  the  books;  but,  something  occurred  in  the  room, 
by  which  means  he  did  not  answer^. 


E.  Lutyens. 


To  Major  Gorrequer,  etc.,  etc.,  etc. 
P.S. — I  have  forwarded  the  books^. 


Forsyth,  referring  to  the  three  volumes,  acknowledges  that 
"  Napoleon's  kindly-meant  present  might,  in  the  circumstances,  have 
been  accepted.  He  did  not  send  them  as  coming  from  '  the  Emperor', 
nor  write  the  objectionable  title  in  them  ;  nor  was  there  much  likelihood 
of  a  British  Regiment  being  seduced  from  its  allegiance  by  adding  to  its 
library  a  few  books,  the  gift  of  Napoleon",  and,  the  late  Mr.  R.  C.  Seaton 
wrote  that  one  must  agree  with  the  remarks  of  Forsyth,  adding  "  it  does 
not  appear  that  he — Napoleon — ever  heard  of  the  fate  of  his  present  ; 
but,  if  he  had,  there  is  no  doubt  that  he  would  have  felt  what  had 
happened  as  a  deliberate  insult  ". 

Norwood  Young,  in  "  Napoleon  in  Exile  at  St.  Helena  (1815- 
-1821)",  Vol.  II.,  page  215,  referring  to  the  circumstances  of  the  gift, 
says,"  he  (Napoleon)  then  began  to  praise  British  soldiers,  and  finally 
said  he  would  present  to  the  oflnicers  of  the  20th,  Coxe's  "  Life  of 
Marlborough  ",  which  had  been  given  him  by  the  Hon.  Robert  Spencer, 
in  the  previous  October.       Spencer  had  touched  at  St.  Helena  on  the 

way  home  from  the  East Napoleon  had  always  admired 

Marlborough He  was  much  interested  in  the  biography, 

and  made  Madame  Bertrand  translate  the  greater  part  of  the  two* 
volumes  into  French,  for  his  reading. 


*  Where  is  this  French  translation  ?     Perhaps  it  was  viva  voce. 
®  This  would  appear  to  be  an  evasion. 

^  Coxe's  Life  of  Marlborough,  in  three  volumes, 

*  Two  is  an  error  for  three. 


A   GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 


Spencer  wrote  in  the  first  volume  : — 

Hunc  de  Proavi  rebus  gestis  librum 

Napoleoni  mittit 
Ducis  Marlburiensis  Pronepos 

Robertus  Spencer 

A.D.  1817^ 


Somebody  had  added  the  words  '  I'Empereur  Napoleon*.  Perhaps 
this  was  done  by  Bertrand,  or  Montholon". 

This  Latin  inscription  may  be  translated — 

Robert  Spencer,  a  great-grandson  of  the  Duke  of  Marlborough, 
sends  this  book,  narrating  the  deeds  of  his  ancestor,  to  Napoleon,  A.D. 
1817^.  It  is  to  be  found  in  the  British  Museum,  Additional 
Manuscripts,  Volume  20,128,  folio  509. 

The  lines  are  written  in  a  studied,  clerk-like,  hand,  and,  they  have 
been  copied  by  someone  not  well-versed  in  Latin  :  for,  in  the  last 
line,  Ducis  appears  to  be  written  Ducio,  the  last  syllable  is  separated 
from  the  other  syllables  of  the  next  word,  and  Robertus  Spencer  appears 
to  be  written  as  Tholertus  Spenen.  Apparently,  the  copyist  had  before 
him  the  original  inscription,  and  its  writing  was  somewhat  illegible. 
A  writer,  quoting  from  memory,  would  not  have  made  these  mistakes. 
Where  is  the  original  fly-leaf  ?  What  authority  is  there  for  saying  that 
it  was  torn  out  of  Volume  I.  of  Coxe's  "Life  of  Marlborough  "  ?  Binders 
say  that  there  is  no  page  missing  from  that  volume.  And,  why  does 
Norwood  Young,  Vol.  II.,  page  215,  when  quoting  this  document,  give 
its  date  as  "  A.D.  1817  ",  instead  of  "  1819  ",  which  is  the  date  given 
in  the  inscription  ? 

The  Honourable  Robert  Spencer,  commanding  H.M.S.  Owen 
Glendower,  arrived  at  S.  Helena  on  October  25th,  1820.  Mr.  Charles 
Harold  Athill,  Clarenceux  King  of  Arms,  has  been  so  kind  as  to 
supply  me  with  a  pedigree  showing  his  connection  with  the  Marlborough 
family  : — 


» 1817  is  ftn  error  for  1819. 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

John  Churchill,  1st  Duke  of  Marlborough,  =  Sarah  Jennings, 
born  1650,  died  1722.  | 

1 

Charles  Spencer,  3rd  Earl  of  Sunderland,  =  Anne,    2nd    dau.,    marr. 
died  1722^ ^|         1699,  died  1716. 

I 
John  Spencer,  3rd  Son,  =Georgiana  Carolina,   dau. 


born  1708,  died  1746. 


of  Earl   Granville,   marr. 
1733. 


John  Spencer,  1st  Earl  Spencer,  =  Margaret  Georgiana,  dau. 


born  1734,  died  1783 


of  the  Right  Hon.  Stephen 
Poyntz,  marr.  1755,  died 
1814. 


George  John  Spencer,   2nd   Earl   Spencer, =Lavinia,   dau.  of  Charles 


born  1758 


1st  Earl  of  Lucan,  marr. 
1781,  died  1831. 


Hon.  Sir  Robert  Cavendish  Spencer,  K.C.H.,  Captain 
Royal  Navy,  2nd  Son,  born  24th  October,  1791,  died 
unmarried  4th  November,  1830,  on  board  H.M.S. 
"  Madagascar",  off  Alexandria  :  Private  Secretary  and 
Groom  of  the  Bedchamber  to  H.R.H.  the  Duke  of 
Clarence,  Lord  High  Admiral,  August,  1827,  to  September, 
1828. 

The  three  volumes  of  Coxe's  "  Life  of  Marlborough",  I  have  submitted 
to  Mr.  Francis  Edwards,  the  well-known  bookseller,  and  also  to  Mr. 
G.  F.  Ayling,  the  well-known  bookbinder,  and,  after  careful  examination, 
they  describe  them  as  follows  : — Demi-quarto,  full  diced-calf,  gilt  backs, 
and  gilt  borders.  They  point  out  that  the  title-page  of  Volume  I.  has 
been  damaged  and  mounted,  and  a  paper-guard  has  been  fastened  in, 
to  carry  letters.  No  fly-leaf  has  been  removed,  such  as  might  have 
borne  the  above-mentioned  Latin  inscription  :  in  fact,  such  inscription 
was  never  on  an  original  fly-leaf  of  the  volumes. 

With  regard  to  the  handwriting  of  Napoleon,  the  following  extract 
from  the  "  Foreign  Reminiscences  "  of  Henry  Richard  Lord  Holland, 
edited  by  his  son,  Henry  Edward  Lord  Holland,  dated  1850,  page  291, 
is  worth  notice  : — 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

His  proficiency  in  literature  has  been  variously  stated.  He  had 
read  much,  but  had  written  little.  In  the  mechanical  part  he  was 
certainly  no  adept  ;  his  handwriting  was  nearly  illegible.  Some  would 
fain  persuade  me  that  that  fault  was  intentional,  and  merely  an  artifice 
to  conceal  his  bad  spelling  ;  that  he  could  form  his  letters  well  if  he 
chose,  but  was  unwilling  to  let  his  readers  know  too  exactly  the  use 
he  made  of  them.  His  orthography  was  certainly  not  correct  ;  that  of 
few  Frenchmen,  not  professed  authors,  was  so  thirty  years  ago  :  but, 
his  brothers  Lucien  and  Lewis,  both  literary  men,  and  both  correct 
in  their  orthography,  write  a  similar  hand,  and  nearly  as  bad  a  one  as 
he  did,  probably  for  the  same  reason,  namely,  that  they  cannot  write 
a  better  without  great  pains  and  loss  of  time. 

Napoleon,  when  Consul  and  Emperor,  seldom  wrote,  but  he  dictated 
much.  It  was  difficult  to  follow  him,  and  he  often  objected  to  any 
revision  of  what  he  had  dictated.  When  a  word  had  escaped 
his  amanuensis,  and  he  was  asked  what  it  was,  he  would  answer  somewhat 
pettishly,  "  Je  ne  r^p^terai  pas  le  mot.  R^fl^chissez,  rappelez  vous  du 
mot  que  j'ai  dict^,  et  ^crivez-le,  car  pour  moi  je  ne  le  r^p^terai  pas^  ". 
Talleyrand,  interested  possibly  in  discrediting  an}'-  posthumous  writings, 
was  very  earnest,  soon  after  the  news  of  his  death  arrived,  in  inculcating 
on  me  and  others  the  persuasion  that  Napoleon  never  did  and  never 
could  dictate.     "  II  disait,  il  ne  dictait  pas  ;  on  ne  pouvait  ^crire  sous  sa 

dict^e.      II  ne  sgavait  ni  dieter  ni  ^crire^  " But,  excepting  Talleyrand 

and  Charles  IV.  of  Spain,  I  never  heard  anyone  express  a  doubt  of  his 
powers  of  composition,  or  his  habits  of  dictating.  It  was,  indeed,  difficult 
to  follow  and  yet  more  difficult  to  satisfy  him  in  the  discharge  of  that 
office  ;  but  M.  Bignon  and  others — Cambac^res,  Barb^-Marbois,  Daru, 
Las  Cases,  Bertrand,  and  many  more — inured  themselves  to  his  manner. 
In  matters  of  importance  he  would  look  over  and  correct  what  had  been 
written  from  his  dictation,  and  would  afterwards  repeat  word  for  word 
the  sentences  he  had  composed  and  revised.  His  style  was  clear.  "  Soyez 
clair,  tout  le  reste  viendra^",  was  a  maxim  of  his.  In  matters  of  business, 
he  very  justly  ridiculed  and  defied  that  absurd  canon  of  French  criticism 
which  forbids  the  recurrence  of  a  word  twice  in  the  same  sentence,  or 
even  page. 


'  Translation  :  "  I  will  not  repeat  the  word.  Think,  and  recall  the  word  that 
I  dictated,  and  write  it  down  ',   for,  I  tell  you,  I  will  not  repeat  it". 

'  Translation  :  "  he  said  he  did  not  dictate  ;  his  dictation  could  not  be  taken 
down  in  writing.    He  knew  neither  how  to  dictate,  nor  how  to  write". 

'Translation  :     "be  clear,  and  all  the  rest  will  follow". 


<7i-     / 


Ct>-I 


M  E  M  ()  I  R  S 

OF 

JOHN   DUKE   OF   M  \RLB()ROll(;H, 

ORIGINAL   CORRESPONDENCE  . 

FROM  THE  FAMILY  RECORDS  AT  BLENHEIM 

OTHRIl  AUTHENTIC   .SOVKCE.S. 

WITH    PORTRAITS,    MAPS.    AND    MILITARY    FLANS 


BY  V/ILLIAM  COXE,  M.A.  F.R.S.  F  S.A 

ARCHDEACON    OF   WILTS 


VOL.   III. 


LONDON : 

PRINTED  FOIl  LONGMAN,  HURST,  REES,  ORME  and  BROWN, 
1819. 


Title  Page  with  the  inscnj)tion  "  rEmpeieur  Napoleon 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

It  is  obvious  that  the  inscription  "  L'Empereur  Napoleon  "  was  not 
written  by  the  Emperor.  Many  fac-similes  of  his  handwriting  may  be 
seen  in  the  beautiful  Napoleonic  volume  printed  by  the  collector,  John 
Sainsbury  entitled,  "  The  Napoleon  Museum,  the  History  of  France 
illustrated,  from  Louis  XIV.  to  the  end  of  the  Reign  and  Death  of  the 
Emperor  ",  which  I  searched  in  vain  for  fac-similes  of  the  handwriting 
of  Marchand  and  St.  Denis.  In  this  connection,  it  may  be  of  interest 
to  state  that  my  copy  bears  the  date  1845.  The  figure  five  (V)  has  been 
added  both  on  the  back,  as  well  as  on  the  title-page  of  the  book,  as  I 
understand  that  the  volume  was  ready  for  publication  in  1840 
(MDCCCXL),  but  not  issued  actually  until  five  years  later 
(MDCCCXLV).  On  the  fly-leaf,  in  the  handwriting  of  the  author, 
is  the  statement,  in  allusion  to  Napoleon,  "  the  eagle  and  the  bee  are 
emblematical  of  soaring  and  of  industry  ". 


CHAPTER  II. 
INSCRIPTION  OF  THE  GIFT. 

IF  it  must  be  admitted  that  the  handwriting  of  the  inscription  in 
the  three  volumes  is  not  that  of  Napoleon,  a  fact  obvious  to  any 
Napoleonic  student,  then,  whose  is  it  ?  I  have  in  my  possession 
a  copy  of  the  Catalogue  of  the  books  of  the  late  Mr.  A.  M.  Broadley. 
There  was  no  handwriting,  however,  in  that  volume  which  seemed  to 
be  of  help.  And  so,  I  placed  myself  into  communication  with  some 
of  the  Napoleonic  specialists,  whose  opinions  were  likely  to  be  of  value. 
These  included  Dr.  Arnold  Chaplin,  the  late  Mr.  Birney  Fickling, 
Rev.  E.  Brook  Jackson,  the  Hon.  J.  W.  Fortescue,  Dr.  J.  Holland  Rose 
and  Mr.  Norwood  Young. 

I  wrote,  also,  to  Mr.  John  Lane,  sending  him  a  copy  of  the  photo- 
graph of  the  inscription  in  the  volumes,  which  he  forwarded 
with  my  letter  to  his  friend  Monsieur  Pierre  Am^d^e  Pichot,  from 
whom  he  received  a  letter  of  which  the  following  is  an  extract  : — 

132  Boulevard  Haussmann,  Paris,  April  20th,  1916. 
Dear  Mr.  Lane, 

I  thank  you  very  much  indeed  for  sending  a  copy  of  Sir  Lees 
Knowles's  volume*,  so  beautifully  got  up,  and  I  daresay  Masson  will 
like  it  too.  In  bringing  before  him  the  object  of  your  letter,  I  found  he 
was  well  acquainted  with  the  work  and  he  believes  that  the  inscription 
on  the  volumes^  presented  to  the  XX.  Regiment  is  by  the  hand  of 
Marchand,  or  may  be  of  Saint  Denis,  another  of  Napoleon's  officials. 
Both  writings  are  so  very  much  alike  that  it  is  difficult  to  say  which  is 
which.  The  inscription  "  I'Empereur  Napoleon  "  used  to  be  put  on  all 
the  books  of  the  library,  and  it  is  from  that  library  that  the  dying 
Emperor  caused  the  three  volumes  he  placed  in  Arnott's  hands  to  be 


^  The  Letters  of  Captain  Engelbert  Lutyena. 
^Coxe's  "Life  of  Marlborough". 


10 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

drawn.  The  whole  particulars  of  the  fact  have  been  related  by  Fr^d^ric 
Masson  in  his  history  of  Napoleon  k  Ste  H^l^ne  (OUendorf,  edition  in 
8vo,  1912,  page  459),  by  which  it  appears  that  the  work  sent  to  the 
English  Regiment  was  the  French  translation,  printed  by  order  of  the 
Emperor  at  the  Imperial  Printing  Office  in  the  year  1806.  Thus  Sir 
Lees  Knowles's  statement  that  the  book  had  been  given  to  Napoleon 
in  October,  1820  by  the  Honourable  Robert  Spencer  (page  109  of  the 
Letters  of  Captain  Engelbert  Lutyens),  and  the  query  in  the  note,  page 
110,  "where  is  the  translation",  should  not  be  correct.  Masson  has  two 
copies,  and  it  is  not  at  all  a  scarce  book^  ". 

It  would  appear  that  Monsieur  Fr^d^ric  Masson,  and  other 
writers  have  confused  two  works  relating  to  Marlborough,  one  printed 
about  1806  in  France,  and  the  other  printed  about  1819  in  England, 
the  former  in  French,  the  latter  in  English.  The  following  observations, 
relating  to  the  former,  will  help  to  explain  the  probable  cause  of  con- 
fusion. 

In  the  John  Rylands  Library,  Manchester,  is  a  copy  of  the  History 
of  "  Jean  Churchill  ".  It  is  in  three  volumes  inscribed  Histoire  de  Jean 
Churchill,  Due  de  Marlborough  :  imprim^  par  les  soins  de  J.  J.  Marcel, 
Directeur  g^n^ral  de  I'lmprimerie  imp^riale,  Membre  de  la  Legion 
d'honneur.  In  the  first  volume,  the  Duke  is  described  as  "  Due  de 
Marlborough,  Prince  du  Saint  Empire  Romain  et  de  Mindelheim, 
Capitaine  G6n6ral  des  Forces  Angloises  et  HoUandoises  sous  la  Reine 
Anne,  Grand-mattre  de  I'Artillerie,  etc.,  etc.".  :  and  in  the  second  and 
third  volumes  as  "  Due  de  Marlborough,  Prince  du  Saint  Empire 
Romain  et  de  Mindelheim,  Capitaine  G^n^ral  des  troupes  Angloises 
sous  la  Reine  Anne,  Grand-maitre  de  I'Artillerie,  Commandant  en 
Chef  de  I'Arm^e  des  Allies,  etc.,  etc.".  On  the  fly-leaf  of  the  first  volume 
is  a  note  in  Lord  Spencer's  handwriting,  "  This  book  was  sent  as  a  present 
to  my  Father  about  the  year  1809,  or  1810,  by  the  Emperor  Napoleon  : 
another  copy  was  sent  at  the  same  time  to  the  Prince  Regent,  and  a 
third  to  the  then  Duke  of  Marlborough  ".  (Signed)  Spencer. 

The  first  volume  is  dated  as  follows  :  "  Tome  Premier.  A  Paris, 
de  rimprimerie  Imp^riale.  An  XIII.  =  1805".  The  other  volumes  : 
"  Tome  Second.     1806  ",  and  "  Tome  Troisidme.     1806  ". 

Each  title-page  bears  a  quotation  from  Horace.  Below  is  the 
Latin,  with  a  translation  taken  from  "  The  Odes  and  Epodes  of  Horace, 


*  There  is  evidently  a  confusion  between  two  works.  The  three  volumes  of  Coxe's 
"Life  of  Marlborough"  bear  the  date  1819. 


11 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

selected  by  S.  A.  Courtauld",  Book  I.,  Ode  VI.,  To  Agrippa  (M.  Vipsanius 
Agrippa,  the  foremost  war-minister  of  Augustus  :  commanded  at  the 
battle  of  Actium). 

Quis  Martem  tunicd  tectum  adamantine  digne  scripserit     .      .     ? 

Whose  harp  the  warlike  Mars  in  mail  arrayed  ....  hath 
hymned  aright  ? 

(Author)  G.  J.  Whyte-Melville. 

Or,  from  the  works  of  Horace  translated  literally  by  C.  Smart,  "  who  with 
sufficient  dignity  will  describe  Mars  covered  with  adamantine  coat 
of  mail,     .      .      .      .     ? " 

In  the  first  volume  is  a  portrait  of  Jean  Churchill,  Due  de  Marl- 
borough, with  his  arms,  and  his  autograph  :  and,  it  is  stated  "  cette 
signature  a  H6  calqu^e  sur  la  signature  originale  du  Duc"^  The  Avant- 
propos,  or  Introduction,  begins,  "  Un  grand  homme  appartient  k  tous 
les  peuples,  et  a  tous  les  siecles  "  ^. 

Upon  inquiry  as  to  the  authority  for  the  statement  at  the  British 
Museum  that  the  Histoire  de  Jean  Churchill,  Due  de  Marlborough, 
3  tom.  Paris,  1806.,  8°.  10,817.  bbb3.,  was  "  composed  principally  by 
Madgett,  edited  and  enlarged  by  the  Abb6  J.  F.  H.  Dutems",  I  received 
the  following  reply  :  "  the  authority  for  the  statement  respecting  the 
authorship  of  '  Histoire  de  Jean  Churchill '  is  Barbier  :  '  Dictionnaire 
des  ouvrages  anonymes',  tom.  2.  p.  674.  '  Histoire  de  Jean  '  Churchill, 
Due  de  Marlborough  (compos^e  principalement  par  Madgett,  interpr^te 
au  Minist^re  de  la  Marine,  r^digee  et  augment^e  par  I'abb^  H.  Dutems)". 

I  received  much  kind  help  from  Mr.  J.  P.  Gilson,  the  Keeper  of  the 
Manuscripts  and  Egerton  Librarian,  and  from  Messrs.  A.  Hughes-Hughes 
and  D.  T.  Baird  Wood  of  his  Department.  Mr.  Wood  has  an  inti- 
mate connection  with  St.  Helena,  being  a  grandson  of  Major  Thomas 
Montgomery  Hunter  of  the  St.  Helena  Artillery — Commission  as 
Lieutenant  1810,  Town-Major  1827— , who  died  about  1860,  having 
spent  the  end  of  his  life  at  Portishead,  near  Clevedon,  Somersetshire, 
where  he  had  the  small  brass  saluting-cannons  from  Longwood,  and 
other  Napoleonic  relics.  Mr.  Wood  wrote,  "  We  do  not  seem 
to  have  any  autograph  of  St.  Denis,  though  there  are  copies 
of  two  of  his  letters  in  the  Lowe  papers  ",  and  he  expressed  his  opinion 
that  the  inscription  in  the  books  was  in  the  handwriting  of  St.  Denis. 
Moreover,  he  showed  the  photographs  to  Mr.  Gilson,  who  agreed  that 

'  Translation  :  A  tracing  from  an  original  signature  of  the  Duke. 
-'  Translation  :   A  hero  belongs  to  all  nations,  and  all  ages. 


12 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

all  the  inscriptions  in  the  books — "  TEmpereur  Napoleon  " — were  by 
one  hand,  and  that  not  the  hand  of  Marchand.  Dr.  J.  Holland  Rose 
said  that  he  did  not  know  the  handwriting,  and  feared,  therefore,  that 
he  could  not  help  me.  Mr.  Norwood  Young  wrote,  "  There  are 
signatures  of  all  the  Longwood  inmates  among  the  Lowe  papers  at  the 
British  Museum,  and  also  at  the  Record  Office.  An  examination  of 
these  would  lead  to  the  identification  of  the  handwriting  you  name.  If 
you  have  already  made  these  searches,  I  can  offer  no  further  suggestion". 
I  had  searched  without  success. 

There  were  no  autographs  of  Marchand  and  St.  Denis  in  the 
"  Collectanea  Napoleonica  ",  a  Catalogue  of  the  collection  of  autographs, 
historical  documents,  etc.,  relating  to  Napoleon  I.  and  his  times 
(1769-1821),  formed  by  the  late  Mr.  A.  M.  Broadley,  now,  I  believe, 
in  the  possession  of  the  Earl  Curzon  of  Kedleston.  In  the  preface,  Mr. 
Broadley  himself  states  that,  taking  the  "  Life  "  of  Mr.  Rose,  and  the 
"  Last  Phase  "  of  Lord  Rosebery  as  a  basis,  he  had  devoted  the  spare 
moments  of  four  years,  and  a  certain  amount  of  constitutional  energy, 
to  extending  the  original  three  octavo  volumes  into  twenty-eight  folios. 
Moreover,  Mr.  Broadley  adds,  "  as  far  as  letters,  state-documents,  and 
other  forms  of  MSS.  are  concerned,  there  is  scarcely  a  single  man  or 
woman  who  played  a  part  of  the  smallest  importance  in  the  great 
Napoleonic  drama,  whose  calligraphy  is  not  to  be  found  in  one  or  other 
of  these  twenty-eight  volumes". 

Among  the  Foreign  Letters  in  the  British  Museum,  relating  to 
Sir  Hudson  Lowe,  volume  15,729,  folios  132-134,  are  two  lists  of  the 
contents  of  boxes  which  Napoleon  desired  Marchand  to  hand  to  his 
son,  the  King  of  Rome.  These  are  set  out  at  length,  with  the  contents 
of  another  box,  in  "  La  Captivity  de  Saint-H^ldne  d'apres  les  rapports 
in^dits  du  Marquis  de  Montchenu,  Commissaire  du  Gouvernement  du  Roi 
Louis  XVIII.  dans  L'lle,  par  Georges  Firmin-Didot,  Secretaire 
D'Ambassade",  printed  in  Paris  in  1894.  In  a  note,  the  Author  gives  as  his 
authority  Archives  Affaires  etrangeres,  volume  1,805,  folio  181,  etsuiv: .  An 
examination  of  the  handwriting  of  those  lists  proves,  I  think,  con- 
clusively that  they  are  written  by  the  same  hand  as  that  which  wrote  the 
inscription  "  L'Empereur  Napoleon  "  in  the  three  Volumes  of  Coxe. 
The  two  lists  which  are  to  be  found  in  the  British  Museum  are  reproduced 
in  this  book,  and  the  letter  "  N  "  of  the  name  Napoleon  should  be 
particularly  noticed. 

The  following  extract  is  taken  from  "La  Captivite  de  Sainte-H^ldne", 
page  320  :— 


13 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

"  Etat  des  bottes  que  Marchand  doit  remettre  k  mons  fils. 

II  consiste  en  trois  boltes  acajou,  Nos  1,  2,  3. 

La  premiere  bolte  No  1  est  k  double  fond,  a  15  pouces  de  long  et 
contient  : 

Le  premier  fond  19  tabatidres      19 

Le  second     „       14  „  14 

Total  des  tabatidres      33 

No. 

1.  La  sagesse  de  Scipion,  donn^e  par  le  pape  Pie  VII.  k  I'Empereur  lors 
du  couronnement. 

2.  Le  roi  de  Rome  enfant,  tabati^re  dont  I'Empereur  a  fait  usage 
pendant  plusieurs  ann^es. 

3.  Portrait  de  I'imp^ratrice  Josephine,  premiere  femme  de  I'Empereur 
Napoleon. 

4.  Tabati^re  ovale  longue,  contenant  4  m6dailles  du  se  trouve  Jules 
C6sar.     L'Empereur  s'est  souvent  servi  de  cette  tabati6re. 

5.  Tabatilre  orn^e  du  portrait  du  roi  et  de  la  reine  de  Westphalia. 

6.  Petite  boite  k  cure-dents,  orn^e  du  portrait  de  Madame. 

7.  Tabatidre  quarr6e,  orn6e  de  5  m^dailles  du  moyen  dge. 

8.  Tabati^re  quarr^e,  orn^e  d'un  cam6e  ;     portrait  de  Madame  fort 
ressemblant. 

9.  Botte  k  odeur. 

9^.  Bonbonnidre,  orn^e  du  portrait  de  la  reine  de  Naples,  soeur  de 
I'Empereur. 

10.  TabatiSre  ronde  ;    4  portraits  :    I'imp^ratrice  Josephine,  le  prince 
Eugene,  la  reine  Hortense,  le  roi  de  Hollande. 

11.  Tabati^re  ovale,  orn^e  de  3  m^dailles,  parmi  lesquelles  se  trouve 
celle  de  Cdsar.      L'Empereur  s'est  souvent  servi  de  cette  tabati^re. 

12.  F6d6ration  de  Milan  ou  creation  de  la  R6publique  Cisalpine,  en 
1797. 

12^.  Tabati^re  quarr^e,  orn6e  d'une  agate. 

13.  T6te  d'AlieKandre,  cam6e  antique. 

14.  Auguste  et  Livie  :   cam^e  antique,  le  seul  qui  existe. 

15.  Tabati^re  orn^e  d'un  cam6e  :  portrait  de  I'Empereur. 

16.  Portrait  de  Turenne. 

17.  Tabati^re  oru6e  de  perles,  offrant  une  vue  de  Laeken. 


14 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

Second  fond. 

18.  Pierre  I",  empereur  de  Russie. 

19.  Plan  de  Vienne. 

20.  Deux  portraits  des  deux  nieces  de  I'Empereur,  filles  du  roi  Joseph. 

21.  Paysage  en  mosaique. 

22.  Charlemagne. 

23.  Bataille  de  Marengo,  donn^e  par  la  ville  de  Dieppe. 

24.  Bonbonni^re,  orn^e  du  portrait  de  Madame. 

25.  Portrait  du  roi  Joseph,  frdre  ain6  de  I'Empereur. 

26.  Bolte  d'or  enrichie  de  diamants,  donn^e  k  I'Empereur  par  I'empereur 
de  Perse. 

27.  Fr^d^ric  le  Grand  k  Potsdam. 

28.  Une   t^te   d' Alexandre. 

29.  Une  bolte,  pierre  de  lave,  avec  3  m^dailles. 

30.  Le  roi  de  Rome,  priant  Dieu  pour  la  France  et  pour  son  p6re. 

31.  Portrait    de    l'imp6ratrice    Marie-Louise,    tabati6re    que    portait 
souvent  I'Empereur. 

Nota. — Dans  plusieurs  de  ces  boltes,  il  existe  des  decorations  de  la 

Legion  d'honneur,  de  la  Couronne  de  Fer  et  de  la  Reunion  que 

"  portait  I'Empereur,  et  une  grande  croix  de  la  Legion  d'honneur." 

[translation.] 

"  Contents  of  the  boxes  which  Marchand  is  to  hand  to  my  son. 
They  are  enclosed  in  three  mahogany  boxes,  Nos.  1,  2,  3. 
The  first  box,  No.  1,  with  two  recesses,  is  15  inches  in  length,  and 
contains  : 

the  first  recess,   19  snuff-boxes 19 

the  second    „     14  „  14 

Total  number  „  33 

1.  The  wisdom  of  Scipio,  given  by  Pope  Pius  VIL  to  the  Emperor  at 
his  coronation. 

2.  The  King  of  Rome  as  a  child,  a  snuff-box  which  the  Emperor  used 
for  many  years. 

3.  Portrait  of  the  Empress  Josephine,  the  first  wife  of  the  Emperor 
Napoleon. 

4.  A  long  oval  snuff-box,  containing  four  medallions,  including  Julius 
Caesar.      The  Emperor  used  this  snuff-box  often. 

5.  A  snuff-box  ornamented  with  portraits  of  the  King  and  Queen 
of  Westphalia. 


16 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

6.  A  small  tooth-pick  box,  ornamented  with  the  portrait  of  Madame. 

7.  A  square  snuff-box,  ornamented  with  five  mediaeval  medallions. 

8.  A  square  snuff-box,  ornamented  with  a  cameo  ;  portrait,  a  striking 
likeness  of  Madame. 

9.  A  perfume-box. 

9^.  A  sweet-meat  box,  ornamented  with  a  portrait  of  the  Queen  of 
Naples,  sister  of  the  Emperor. 

10.  A  round  snuff-box  ;  four  portraits  :  the  Empress  Josephine, 
Prince  Eugene,  Queen  Hortense,  the  King  of  Holland. 

11.  An  oval  snuff-box,  ornamented  with  three  medallions,  among 
them  one  of  Csesar.     The  Emperor  used  this  snuff-box  often. 

12.  The  Federation  of  Milan  or  the  creation  of  the  Cisalpine  Republic, 
1797. 

12^.  A   square   snuff-box  ornamented  with   an  agate. 

13.  Head  of  Alexander,  antique  cameo. 

14.  Augustus  and  Livy  :    antique  cameo,  the  only  one  in  existence. 

15.  A  snuff-box  ornamented  with  a  cameo  :    portrait  of  the  Emperor. 

16.  Portrait  of  Turenne. 

17.  Snuff-box  ornamented  with  pearls,  showing  a  view  of  Laeken. 

Second  recess. 

18.  Peter  the  First,  Emperor  of  Russia. 

19.  Plan  of  Vienna. 

20.  Two  portraits  of  the  two  nieces  of  the  Emperor,  daughters  of 
King  Joseph. 

J^l.  Landscape  in  mosaic. 

22.  Charlemagne. 

23.  The  Battle  of  Marengo,  presented  by  the  town  of  Dieppe. 

24.  Sweet-meat  box,  ornamented  with  a  portrait  of  Madame. 

25.  Portrait  of  King  Joseph,  elder  brother  of  the  Emperor. 

26.  A  gold  box  embellished  with  diamonds,  given  to  the  Emperor  by  the 
Emperor  of  Persia. 

27.  Frederick  the  Great  at  Potsdam. 

28.  A  head  of  Alexander. 

29.  A  box  made  of  lava,  with  three  medallions. 

30.  The  King  of  Rome,  praying  to  God  for  France  and  for  his  father. 

31.  A  portrait  of  the  Empress  Marie-Louise,  a  snuff-box  which  the 
Emperor  carried  often. 

Note. — In  several  of  these  boxes,  there  are  decorations  of  the  Legion 
d'honneur,  of  the  Couronne  de  Fer  and  of  the  Reunion  which  the 
Emperor  wore,  and  a  grand  cross  of  the  Legion  d'honneur  ". 


16 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

In  the  British  Museum,  among  "  Foreign  letters",  Volume  15,729, 
Folio  132,  are  two  lists  Nos.  2  and  3,  list  No.  1  being  missing.  There 
is  no  doubt  that  they  are  by  the  same  hand  that  wrote  "  I'Empereur 
NapoMon  "  in  Coxe's  "Life  of  Marlborough",  the  initial  capital  letter 
*  N  '  in  the  lists,  and  in  the  name  Napoleon,  being  noticeably  alike. 
There  is  also,  in  the  Additional  Manuscripts  at  the  British  Museum, 
Volume  30,142,  Folios  63-67,  a  beautifully- written  document  by  the 
same  hand.  See  "  A  Polish  Exile  with  Napoleon",  by  G.  L.  de  St.  M. 
Watson,  page  101.  Herewith  are  copies  of  lists  No.  2  and  No.  3,  with 
translations,  which,  with  list  No.  1,  will  be  of  use  for  collectors. 


No.  2. 

fitat  des  boltes  que  Marchand  doit  remettre  k  mon  fils. 

1.  Douze  boites  aux  armes  Imp^riales. 

2.  Deux  petites  lunettes,   dont  se  servait  TEmpereur  k  I'arm^e. 

3.  Une  boite  No  1,  en  pierre  de  Russie,  orn6e  d'un  portrait. 

4.  Une  boite  en  ivoire. 

5.  Une  chasse  k  Fontainebleau. 

6.  Une  boite  d'or,  avec  un  paysage  en  ivoire. 


No.  3. 

Etat  d'une  boite  que  Marchand  doit  remettre  k  mon  fils. 

Trois  tabati^res,  dont  se  servait  I'Empereur  k  St.  H616ne,  savoir  : 

1.  Une  tabati^re  orn^e  de  quatre  m^dailles  d'argent. 

2.  Une  tabatidre  orn^e  de  deux  m^dailles  d'argent. 

3.  Une  tabati^re  orn^e  de  trois  m^dailles  d'argent. 

4.  Deux  cordons  de  la  Legion  d'honneur. 

5.  Une  paire  de  boucles  d'or  a  souliers,  dont  se  servait  I'Empereur 
k  Ste  H^l^ne. 

6.  Une  boucle  de  col,  ditto. 

7.  Une  paire  de  boucles  k  jarreti^res. 

8.  Une  bonbonnidre  en  4caille. 

9.  Une  grosse  montre  d'argent.    Cette  montre  se  mettait  dans  la  volture 
de  I'Empereur  en  campagne. 

10.  Une  petite  lorgnette,  du  nombre  de  celles  dont  se  servait  I'Empereur 
a  I'arm^e. 

11.  Un  petit  cachet  aux  armes  de  France. 


17 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

[translation]. 

No.  % 

Contents  of  a  box  which  Marchand  is  to  hand  to  my  son. 

1.  Twelve  boxes  with  the  Imperial  arms. 

2.  Two  small  telescopes  which  the  Emperor  used  in  the  field. 

3.  A  box  No.  1,  of  Russian  marble,  ornamented  with  a  portrait. 

4.  An  ivory  box. 

5.  A  Fontainebleau  hunting-scene. 

6.  A  gold  box  with  a  landscape  in  ivory. 

No.  3. 

Contents  of  a  box  which  Marchand  is  to  hand  to  my  son. 

Three  snuff-boxes,  which  the  Emperor  used  at  St.  Helena,  namely  : — 

1.  A  snuff-box  ornamented  with   four  silver  medallions. 

2.  A  snuff-box  ornamented  with  two  silver  medallions. 

3.  A  snuff-box  ornamented  with  three  silver  medallions. 

4.  Two  cordons  of  the  Legion  of  Honour. 

5.  A  pair  of  gold  shoe-buckles,  which  the  Emperor  wore  at  St.  Helena. 

6.  A   collar-buckle,   ditto. 

7.  A  pair  of  garter-buckles. 

8.  A  mother-of-pearl  sweet-meat  box. 

9.  A  large  silver  watch.      This  watch  was  carried  in  the  Emperor's 
carriage  during  his  campaigns. 

10.  A  small  telescope,  one  of  a  number  of  those  used  by  the  Emperor 
with  the  Army. 

11.  A  small  seal  with  the  French  arms. 


It  has  been  alleged  that  the  Imperial  waistcoat  pockets  were  stained 
with  snuff  :  but,  this  has  been  contradicted  by  Mademoiselle  Bertrand, 
the  daughter  of  Count  Bertrand,  who  states  that  the  stains  were  the 
result  of  a  mixture  of  liquorice-powder  and  brown  sugar,  which  Napoleon 
carried  in  his  pockets,  as  a  remedy  for  chronic  indigestion,  pretending 
to  take  it  like  snuff,  but  really  slipping  it  into  his  mouth.  The  Emperor, 
although  possessing  many  snuff-boxes,  detested  tobacco  in  any  form. 


18 


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^(J)J  £.6. ...... 


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Lists  Nos.  2  and  3,  British  Museum,  Foreign  Letters,  Vol.  15,729, 
Folio  132,  in  the  handwriting  of  St.  Denis. 


CHAPTER  III. 

CORRESPONDENCE. 

The  following  correspondence,  is  in  itself  sufficiently  explicit, 
leading  to  the  proof  that  the  inscription  in  the  three  volumes  of  Coxa's 
"  Life  of  Marlborough  "  is  in  the  handwriting  of  St.  Denis. 

Bibliothdque  Nationale, 

Paris,  le  19  Octobre,  1916. 
Cher  Monsieur, .... 
Je  n'ai  rien  pu  trouver  pour  Saint-Denis,  k  moins  que  Tinscription 
"  TEmpereur  Napoleon  ",  qui  se  trouve  sur  les  volumes  dont  je  vais 
vous  parler  ne  soit  de  sa  main.  Mais,  pour  Marchand,  il  y  a  au 
D^partement  des  Imprimis,  non  seulement  une  note  de  lui  sur  le  faux- 
titre  du  T.  T®  de  la  "  Correspondance  in^dite  officielle  et  confidentielle 
de  Napoleon  I""  (Paris,  1809,  8°),  mais  encore,  jointe  au  volume,  une 
lettre  de  Marchand  k  Thiers. 

L'inscription  "  I'Empereur  Napoleon  ",  et  le  timbre  de  la  biblioth^que 
de  I'Empereur  sont  plus  nets  en  t^te  du  second  volume  du  m^me  ouvrage. 
Je  vous  propose  done  de  vous  faire  photographier. 
1*  La  lettre,  ou  partie  de  la  lettre,  de  Marchand  (dans  le  T.  I""®.) 

2°  L'inscription,  et  le  timbre,  d'apr^s  le  Tome  IL 

*      *      *      * 

JAon  Dorez. 

[translation]. 
Dear  Sir, .... 

I  have  not  been  able  to  find  anything  of  St.  Denis,  unless  the 
inscription  "  the  Emperor  Napoleon  ",  to  be  found  in  the  volumes  of 
which  I  shall  speak,  is  in  his  writing.  But,  with  regard  to  Marchand, 
there  is,  in  the  Department  of  Printed  Matter,  not  only  a  note  by  him  on 
the  fly-leaf  of  the  1st  volume  of  the  "  Unpublished  OSicial  and  Confiden- 
tial Correspondence  of  Napoleon  1st  "  (Paris,  1809, 8°),  but  also,  attached 
to  the  volume,  a  letter  from  Marchand  to  Thiers. 

The  inscription  "  the  Emperor  Napoleon",  and  the  stamp  of  the 
Emperor's  library,  are  clearer  at  the  beginning  of  the  second  volume  of 


19 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

the  above  work.     I  propose,  therefore,  to  have  photographed  for  you 

1.  The  letter,  or  part  of  the  letter,  by  Marchand,  in  the  first  volume. 

2.  The  inscription,  and  the  stamp,  from  the  second  volume. 

*       *       *       * 

lAon  Dorez. 


Direction  des  Archives, 
Archives  Nationales, 

Paris,    le    2    Mars,    1917. 
Monsieur, 

En  r^ponse  k  votre  lettre  du  17  f^vrier,  j'ai  le  regret  de  vous  fairs 
connaltre,  apr^s  recherche,  que  les  Archives  nationales  ne  paraissent  pas 
posseder  d'autographe  de  Saint  Denis,  biblioth^caire  de  Napoleon  P', 
et  que  nous  n'avons  pas  par  suite  le  moyen  de  vous  aider  k  identifier 
I'auteur  de  I'inscription  que  portent  les  volumes  de  la  biblioth^que  de 
Sainte-H^l^ne.  Peut-6tre  M.  Frederic  Masson,  membre  de  I'Academie 
frangaise,  serait-il  en  mesure  de  vous  mieux  renseigner. 

*      *      *      * 

Le  Directeur  des  Archives, 

(Signed)  Charles  V.  Langlois. 


[translation.] 

Direction  des  Archives, 

Archives  Nationales, 

Paris,  March  2nd,  1917. 
Sir, 

In  reply  to  your  letter  of  February  17th,  I  regret  to  inform  you,  after 
a  search,  that  the  National  Archives  do  not  appear  to  possess  the 
autograph  of  Saint  Denis,  librarian  of  Napoleon  I., and  that,  consequently, 
we  have  no  means  of  assisting  you  in  identifying  the  author  of  the 
inscription  contained  in  the  volumes  from  the  library  of  St.  Helena. 
Perhaps  M.  Fr^d^ric  Masson,  member  of  the  Academie  frangaise, 
would  be  in  a  position  to  give  you  better  information. 


(Signed)  Charles  V.  Langlois. 


To  D.  T.  B.  Wood,  Esq.,  M.A., 
Manuscript  Department, 
British  Museum. 


20 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

4,  Park  Street, 

London,  W.I., 

April  2nd,  1917. 

To  Monsieur  Fr^d^ric  Masson,  etc.,  etc.,  etc. 

Sir, 

Will  you  permit  me  to  address  you,  as  a   great  authority  on  the 

history  of  Napoleon,  to  ask  if  you  will  have  the  kindness  to  assist  in  a 

research  that  I  am  making,  which  relates  to  him. 

I  have  in  my  possession  a  book  which  belonged  to  the  Emperor 

when  he  was  at  St.  Helena.    On  the  title-page  is  the  following  manuscript 

inscription,  "  L'Empereur  NapoMon  ".      It  is  my  desire  to  find  out  the 

name  of  the  person  who  wrote  it.     I  believe  it  to  have  been  written  by 

St.  Denis. 

It  is  possible  that  you  may  be  able  to  see,  or  to  obtain,  an  authentic 

specimen  of  the  handwriting  of  St.  Denis,  so  that  I  can  compare  it  with 

the  inscription. 

*      *      *      * 

Lees  Knowle?. 


15  Rue  de  la  Baume, 
Paris, 
le  4  Avril,  1917. 
Monsieur, 
Je  poss^de  moi-m^me  des  livres  provenant  de  Sainte  H^l^ne,  et 
portant  cette  inscription  en  dessus  du  Cachet  a  cire  frappe  k  I'encre. 

Je  pense  qu'elle  est  de  la  main  de  St.  Denis  ;  mais  il  y  a  quasi  identity 
entre  son  ^criture  et  celle  de  Marchand,  seulement  un  peu  plus  pointue. 
Tons  deux  s'^taient  exerc^s  a  ^crire  extremement  fin.  J'ai  beaucoup  vu 
r^criture  de  Marchand,  dont  j'ai  en  mains  les  M^moires.  J'ai  vu 
r^criture  de  St.  Denis,  mais  il  nem'a6t^  permis  que  de  lire  ses  souvenirs 
sans  les  copier. 

Autant  qu'on  pent  se  prononcer  sur  un  specimen  aussi  bref,  je  crois 
que  rinscription  est  de  St.  Denis. 

Croyez,  Monsieur,  k  mes  sentiments  de  haute  consideration. 

(Signed)     Fr6d6ric  Masson. 
k  Sir  Lees  Knowles,  Bart. 


21 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

[translation]. 
Sir, 

I  myself  possess  some  books  which  came  from  St.  Helena,  and 
bearing  this  inscription  above  the  seal  stamped  in  ink. 

I  think  that  it  is  by  the  hand  of  St.  Denis  ;  but,  his  writing  is  almost 
identical  with  that  of  Marchand,  only  a  little  more  pointed.  Both  were 
accustomed  to  write  very  acutely.  I  have  seen  frequently  the  writing 
of  Marchand,  whose  Memoirs  I  have  by  me.  I  have  seen  the  writing  of 
St.  Denis  ;  but,  I  was  allowed  only  to  read  his  memoranda,  without 
copying  them. 

So  far  as  one  can  give  an  opinion  upon  so  short  a  specimen,  I  believe 
the  inscription  to  be  by  St.  Denis. 

ilf  4f  4:  He 

(Signed)     Fr6d4ric  Masson. 
To  Sir  Lees  Knowles,  Bart. 

R6publique  Fran5aise 

Libert^,  figalit^,  Fraternity 
Ville  de  Sens, 

D^partement  de  TYonne. 
Mairie, 

Sens,  le  21  Avril,  1917. 
Monsieur, 
J'ai  I'honneur  de  vous  accuser  reception  de  votre  lettre  du  2  Avril, 
tendant  k  obtenir  un  specimen  de  T^criture  de  M.  Saint-Denis,  qui  fut 
garde  des  livres  de  I'Empereur  Napoleon  k  Ste  H^l^ne. 

Dans  le  but  de  faciliter  vos  recherches,  je  vous  adresse,  sous  ce  pli, 
un  caique  de  la  signature  de  Saint-Denis,  relev^e  sur  un  registre  de  I'Etat 
Civil  de  Sens. 

Je  crois  devoir  vous  donner,  en  meme  temps,  quelques  autres 
indications. 

Sur  tons  les  livres  ayant  fait  partie  de  la  Bibliotheque 
personelle  de  I'Empereur  Napoleon,  k  Ste  H616ne,  existe  un  ex-libris, 
en  ^criture  fine,  ainsi  congu  (imitation  of  the  inscription  "  L'Empereur 
Napoleon")  :     k   cote   figure  un  cachet  aux  armes  implriales. 

Vous  pourriez  utilement  consulter  I'ouvrage  suivant  :  "  M6moires 
de  Fleury  de  Chaboulon,  Ex-Secr^taire  de  I'Empereur  Napoleon  et 
son  cabinet,  avec  annotations  manuscrites  de  Napoleon  1" ",  publics 
par  Lucien  Cornet,  D6put6,  Maire  de  Sens,  6dit^  en  1901  par  M.  Edouard 
Rouveyre,  76,  rue  de  Seine,  k  Paris  (3  volumes,  dont  2  volumes  des 
m^moires,  et  1  des  annotations  k  relier  avec  les  2  autres). 


22 


y^j^  -<•«  /4?  z-~  --/K/iii 


//rj^.a^  9^  a...^. 


/f  .  K /      ■     y  ^    .    17s    ^-  ^    y 

/^A./.,^.,..    /^^  y^yyfy^^,y,^j       , 

"i.  /.  ......  a  /'^_^    -  ^ 

J',..*J. /<,it:       a^'^r      ^*«.er  e-t'-V* 


'.r-y,'  fe4>-si^««t/  i;* 


„,y^::pe^*^' 


Bibliotheque  Nationale.— Letter  of  Marehand. 


Book  inscribed  by  Marchand. 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

Dans  cet  ouvrage  se  trouve  public  le  catalogue  num^rot^  de  la 
Biblioth^que  personelle  de  NapoMon  k  Ste  H^l^ne. 

La  maison  d'^dition  Rouveyre  n'existe  plus  et  je  n'ai,  personellement, 
aucun  volume  disponible,  mais  si  vous  vous  adressiez  k  des  libraires- 
bouquinistes,  il  vous  serait  possible,  je  crois,  de  vous  procurer  cet  ouvrage. 
Dans  I'espoir  que  ces  renseignments  pourront  vous  donner  satis- 
faction, veuillez  agr^er,  Monsieur,  I'expression  de  mes  sentiment  les 
plus  distingu^s. 

Le  Maire, 

S^nateur  de  I'Yonne, 

(Signed)     Lucien  Cornet. 
k  Sir  Lees  Knowles,  Bart. 

[translation]. 

I  have  the  honour  to  acknowledge  the  receipt  of  your  letter  of  April 
2nd,  expressing  a  desire  to  obtain  a  specimen  of  the  writing  of  M. 
Saint-Denis,  who  was  librarian  to  the  Emperor  Napoleon  at  St.  Helena. 

With  the  object  of  assisting  you  in  your  inquiries,  I  send  you,  in 
this  envelope,  a  tracing  of  the  signature  of  Saint-Denis  taken  from  an 
official  document  in  Sens. 

I  think  I  can  at  the  same  time  give  you  some  other  information. 
Upon  all  the  books,  which  constituted  the  personal  library  of  the 
Emperor  Napoleon  at  St.  Helena,  there  is  an  ex-libris  in  small  writing, 
like  this  :  (imitation  of  the  inscription  "  L'Empereur  Napoleon  ")  :  and, 
at  the  side,  there  appears  a  seal  with  the  imperial  arms. 

You  could  with  advantage  consult  the  following  work  :  "  Memoires 
of  Fleury  de  Chaboulon,  ex-Secretary  to  the  Emperor  Napoleon  and  his 
cabinet,  with  manuscript  notes  by  Napoleon  I.",  compiled  by  Lucien 
Cornet,  D6put€,  Mayor  of  Sens,  and  published  in  1901,  by  M.  Edouard 
Rouveyre,  76  Rue  de  Seine,  Paris  (3  volumes,  of  which  2  volumes  are 
of  the  memoirs,  and  1  of  notes  to  bind  with  the  2  others). 

In  this  work  is  published  the  detailed  catalogue  of  the  personal 
library  of  Napoleon  at  St.  Helena. 

The  publishing-house  of  Rouveyre  no  longer  exists  and  I,  personally, 

have  no  spare  copy  ;   but,  if  you  inquire  at  the  old  book-shops,  it  would, 

I  think,  be  possible  for  you  to  procure  the  work. 

In  the  hope  that  this  information  may  be  of  service  to  you, 
*       *       *       * 

(Signed)     The  Mayor,  Senator  of  I'Yonne, 

Lucien  Cornet. 
To  Sir  Lees  Knowles,  Bart. 


23 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 


Mairie, 

Ville  de  Sens, 

le  25  Juillet,  1917. 
Monsieur, 
J'ai  I'honneur  de  vous  accuser  reception  de  votre  lettre  du    18 
Juillet  par  laquelle  vous  me  demandez  I'autorisation  de  faire  photo- 
graphier  le  document  entier  sur  lequel  se  trouve  la  signature  de  St  Denis. 
Ce  document  6tant  un  acte  de  I'Etat  Civil,  j'ai  le  regret  de  ne  pouvoir 
vous  donner  satisfaction,  attendu  que  la  loi  fran^aise  ne  permet  pas  la 
reproduction  que  vous  sollicitez. 

Toutefois,  M.  St.  Denis  ayant  6t6  Conseiller  Municipal  de  Sens,  sa 
signature  figure  sur  d'autres  documents  publics  et  susceptibles  d'ltre 
photographies.  Au  cas  oil  cette  solution  vous  conviendrait,  je  vous 
prie  de  bien  vouloir  m'en  aviser,  et  je  ferai  le  n^cessaire  pour  que  M. 
Provost  puisse  vous  donner  toute  satisfaction  a  ce  sujet. 

Veuillez  agr^er,  Monsieur,  I'expression  de  mes  sentiments  les  plus 
distingu^s. 

Le  Maire, 

(Signed)     Lucien  Cornet. 
k  Sir  Lees  Knowles,  Bart. 


[translation]. 

I  have  the  honour  to  acknowledge  the  receipt  of  your  letter  of  July 
18th,  in  which  you  ask  for  my  authority  to  have  photographed  in  its 
entirety  the  document  on  which  the  signature  of  St,  Denis  appears. 

This  being  an  official  document,  I  regret  that  I  am  unable  to  grant 
your  request,  as  the  French  law  does  not  permit  the  reproduction 
which  you  desire. 

But,  Monsieur  St.  Denis,  having  been  a  Municipal  Councillor  of 
Sens,  his  signature  appears  on  other  documents  which  are  public,  and 
available  for  photography.  If  this  solution  be  agreeable  to  you,  I 
would  ask  you  be  so  kind  as  to  inform  me,  and  I  will  make  the  necessary 
arrangements,  so  that  Monsieur  Prevost  may  give  you  every  satisfaction 
in  the  matter. 

*        Hf        *        *        * 

The  Mayor, 

(Signed)    Lucien   Cornet. 
To  Sir  Lees  Knowles,  Bart. 


34 


X  ^  h'l  ^.     J\f»-fi4A*^ 


CORRESPONDA' 


ET  CONFIDENT! 


,fiON  BONAPA. 


US  eOimS  ferRANOfeRES ,  LES  princes  ,  LES  MINISTR 
J  ET  LES  GfeNERAUX  FRANCAIS  ET  feTRANGERS , 

X:     \  t»  ITAIIE  ,  IS  AILEMAGSE  E»  EIT  EGTOTE. 


Stripta  mantnt- 


ITALIE, 


TOME  DEUXIEME, 


'         PARIS 

C.  L.  F.  PANCROUCRE 

L  MDCCCXn.  1 


Book  inscribed  by  St.  Denis. 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

M'  Alexandre  Corot, 

Notaire, 

51,  Rue  de  la  R^publique, 

Sens  (Yonne), 
Succ''  de  M^  FotU  et  Mercier. 
Sens, 

le  10  Aotit,  1917. 
Monsieur  le  S^nateur, 
Je  m'empresse  de  r^pondre  k  votre  lettre  d'hier,  que  je  regois  seule- 
ment  ce  soir. 

Je  ne  vols,  pour  ma  part,  aucun  inconvenient  k  accorder  ^  M.  le 
Baronnet  Lees  Knowles  ee  qu'il  demande,  mais  je  ne  puis  le  faire  sans 
I'autorisation  de  Tun  des  repr^sentants  de  la  famille,  le  testament 
contenant  un  certain  nombre  de  dispositions  confidentielles. 

J'^cris  done  par  ce  m^me  courrier  a  M.  Fauche,  petit  fils  de  M.  St. 
Denis,  pour  lui  demander  de  m'autoriser  k  laisser  photographier  le 
testament,  tout  au  moins  en  ce  qui  concerne  le  legs  fait  k  la  Ville  de 
Sens  de  divers  objets  ayant  appartenu  k  Napoleon,  la  date,  et  la 
signature. 

Aussitdt  que  j'aurai  sa  r^ponse,  je  vous  en  ferai  part. 
Veuillez  agr^er,  Monsieur  le  S^nateur,  I'assurance  de  mes  sentiments 
distingu^s  et  devours, 

(Signed)     Alexandre  Corot. 
Monsieur  le  S^nateur  Cornet. 


[tiunslation]. 

I  hasten  to  reply  to  your  letter  of  yesterday  which  I  received  only 
this  evening. 

For  my  part  I  see  no  objection  to  agreeing  to  what  Sir  Lees  Knowles 
asks  ;  but,  I  cannot  act  without  the  authority  of  one  of  the  representa- 
tives of  the  family,  as  the  will  contains  a  certain  number  of  confidential 
dispositions. 

I  am  writing,  therefore,  by  this  post  to  M.  Fauche,  grand-son  of 
M.  St.  Denis,  asking  his  permission  to  photograph  the  will,  or  at  least 
so  much  of  it  as  concerns  the  legacy  made  to  the  town  of  Sens  of  the 
various  articles  which  belonged  to  Napoleon,  the  date,  and  the  signature. 

As  soon  as  I  have  his  answer,  I  will  acquaint  you  with  it. 

(Signed)    Alexandre   Corot. 
To  Monsieur  the  Senator  Cornet. 


26 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

Mairie, 

Ville  de  Sens, 

le    13    Aotit,    1917. 
Monsieur, 

En  r^ponse  a  votre  lettre,  j'ai  Phonneur  de  vous  faire  connaitre 
que,  dans  le  but  de  vous  donner  satisfaction,  j'ai  pens6  k  faire  photo- 
graphier  le  testament  olographe  de  M.  Saint-Denis. 

A  cet  effet,  j'ai  consults  le  notaire  de  I'^tude  otl  le  testament  a6t6 
d^pos^,  Je  vous  communique  sous  ce  pli  la  r^ponse  que  m'a  faite  M® 
Corot. 

Veuillez  agr^er,  Monsieur,  I'expression  de  mes  sentiments  les  plus 
distingu6es. 

Le  Maire, 

(Signed)     Lucien  Cornet. 
k  Sir  Lees  Knowles,  Bart. 


[translation]. 

In  answer  to  your  letter,  I  have  the  honour  to  inform  you  that,  with 
the  object  of  assisting  you,  I  have  thought  of  having  a  photograph  taken 
of  the  holograph  will  of  Monsieur  St.  Denis. 

With  this  object  in  view,  I  have  consulted  the  Solicitor,  in  whose 

office  the  will  is  deposited.    Under  this  cover,  I  communicate  the  answer 

which  Maltre  Corot  has  sent  to  me. 

*      *      *      * 

The  Mayor, 

(Signed)  Lucien  Cornet. 
To  Sir  Lees  Knowles,  Bart. 


Copie  d'une  lettre  adress^e  par 

M.  Rollet  a  M*  Corot,  Notaire, 

Fontainebleau, 

le  17  AoAt,  1917. 
Monsieur, 

Je  re9ois  k  I'instant  par  Tinterm^diaire  du  notaire  d'H^ricy,  une 
lettre  que  vous  avez  adress6e  le  10  de  ce  mois  k  Monsieur  Fauche  relative- 
ment  au  testament  St.  Denis. 


26 


^^f^^  ^ryy^y^^y^  ^y^j^^y  z?-;^  V/-^^v/y, 


/\uyy!yO  91  . 


Autograph  of  St.  Denis. 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

M®  Fauche  est  d^c^d^  au  mois  de  Novembre  dernier,  laissant  ses 
deux  soeurs,  dont  ma  femme,  pour  seules  h^riti^res,  et  en  autre  l^gataires 
k  titre  particulier,  des  papiers  et  souvenirs  St.  Denis. 

On  precede  actuellement  k  la  liquidation  de  la  communaut6, 
operation  que  Ton  esp^re  terminer  trds  prochainement,  et,  bien  que 
cette  communaut^  n'ait  rien  k  voir  avec  le  document  dont  vous  parlez, 
nous  desirous  reporter  k  ce  moment  la  r^ponse  qui  sera  donn^e  k  votre 
lettre  apr^s  entente  avec  Monsieur  Michaut,  mon  gendre,  Maitre  de 
Conferences  k  la  Sorbonne  qui  habite  Sceaux,  et  d^tenteur  actuel  des 
papiers  16gu4s, 

Je  n'ai  pas  besoin  de  dire,  Monsieur,  que  la  demande  de  Sir  Lees 
Knowles  sera  examinee  avec  toute  la  bienveillance  possible. 

Je  vous  prie  d'agr^er,  Monsieur,  I'assurance  de  mes  sentiments 
distingu4s. 

(Sign4)     RoUet. 

M®  Rollet,  6  rue   Herschel  k  Paris    (actuellement  k  Fontainebleau). 


[translation]. 

I  have  just  received,  at  the  hands  of  Monsieur  d'H^ricy,  Notary, 
a  letter  which  you  addressed  on  the  10th  of  this  month  to  Monsieur 
Fauche,  relating  to  the  St.  Denis  will. 

Maitre  Fauche  died  in  November  last,  leaving  his  two  sisters,  of 
whom  one  is  my  wife,  as  sole  heiresses  with,  amongst  other  things,  a 
special  title  to  the  St.  Denis  papers  and  souvenirs. 

We  are  now  proceeding  with  the  liquidation  of  the  estate, 
an  operation  which  we  hope  to  finish  shortly  ;  but,  as  the  estate  has 
nothing  to  do  with  the  document  of  which  you  speak,  we  wish  to  consider 
at  this  moment  the  answer  which  will  be  given  to  your  letter  after 
agreement  with  Monsieur  Michaut,  my  son-in-law,  Maitre  de  Conferences 
at  the  Sorbonne,  who  lives  at  Sceaux,  and  the  actual  holder  of  the 
bequeathed  papers. 

I  need  not  say,  Sir,  that  the  request  of  Sir  Lees  Knowles  will  be 
considered  with  all  possible  good-will. 


(Signed)  Rollet 


M.  Rollet  to  Maitre  Corot,  Notary. 


27 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

Sens, 
le  21  Ao6t,  1917. 
Monsieur  le  S^nateur, 

Comme  suite  h  ma  lettre  du  10  eourant  relative  au  testament  de 
M.  St.  Denis,  je  vous  envoie  sous  ce  pli  copie  de  ma  lettre  que  je  viens  de 
recevoir  de  M.  RoUet,  I'un  de  ses  repr6sentants. 

D6s  que  j'aurai  du  nouveau,  je  vous  en  aviserai. 
Veuillez  agr^er,  Monsieur,  le  S6nateur,  I'assurance  de  mes  sentiment 
distingu^s  et  d^vou^s, 

(Signed)     Alexandre  Corot, 
k  Monsieur  le  S^nateur  Cornet. 


[translation]. 

Following  my  letter  of  the  10th  instant,  relative  to  the  will  of 
Monsieur  St.  Denis,  I  send  you  under  this  cover  a  copy  of  a  letter  which 
I  have  just  received  from  Monsieur  RoUet,  one  of  the  representatives 
of  the  family. 

When  I  have  anything  new,  I  will  advise  you. 

*      *      *      * 

(Signed)  Alexandre  Corot. 
To  Monsieur  the  Senator  Cornet. 


Mairie, 

Ville  de  Sens, 

le  24  Aotlt,  1917. 
Monsieur, 

Comme  suite  k  votre  demande,  j'ai  I'honneur  de  vous  transmettre 
sous  ce  pli,  une  lettre  de  M^  Corot  ainsi  que  la  copie  de  celle  qui  lui 
k  6t6  envoy^e  par  I'un  des  membres  de  la  famille  Saint-Denis  relative- 
ment  au  testament  dont  vous  soUicitez  la  reproduction  photographique. 
Veuillez  agr^er,  Monsieur,  I'expression  de  mes  sentiments  les  plus 
distingu^s. 

Le  Maire, 

(Signed)     Lucien  Cornet. 
k  Sir  Lees  Knowles,  Bart. 


28 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

[translation]. 

As  a  sequel  to  your  request,  I  have  the  honour  to  send  you,  under 
this  cover,  a  letter  from  Mattre  Corot,  as  well  as  a  copy  of  one  which 
has  been  sent  to  him  by  one  of  the  members  of  the  Saint-Denis  family, 
relating  to  the  will  of  which  you  desire  the  photographic  reproduction. 

The  Mayor, 

(Signed)    Lucien    Cornet. 
To  Sir  Lees  Knowles,  Bart. 


Mairie, 

Villa  de  Sens, 

le  9  Septembre,  1917. 
Monsieur, 

M®  Corot,  notaire  k  Sens,  vient  de  m'informer  que  M.  Michaut, 
Maitre  de  Conferences  a  la  Sorbonne,  qui  habite  Sceaux  (Seine),  rue  des 
Imberg^res,  35,  lui  a  fait  connaitre,  au  nom  de  la  famUle  Saint-Denis, 
qu'il  autorise  h  laisser  photographier  le  testament  de  M.  Saint-Denis, 
pour  tout  ce  qui  n'a  pas  un  caract^re  familial  et  confidentiel,  c'est-^-dire 
notamment  I'^num^ration  d^taill^e  des  objets  ayant  appartenu  k 
Napoleon,  la  date  du  testament  et  la  signature. 

M®  Corot  se  tient  a  votre  disposition  pour  cette  operation. 
M.  Michaut  a  prie  M®  Corot  de  vous  faire  savoir  que  M.  Saint- 
Denis  a  laiss^  "  des  m^moires  "  que  sa  famille  se  propose  de  publier 
apr^s   la   guerre,   et  il    serait  reconnaissant,   si  vous  aviez  d^couvert 
quelque  detail  touchant  M.  Saint-Denis,  de  les  lui  communiquer. 

Je  vous  engage  done  a  entrer  en  rapporte  avec  M®  Corot,  notaire 
k  Sens,  rue  de  la  R6publique,  51. 

Veuillez  agr^er,  Monsieur,  I'expression  de  mes  sentiments  les  plus 
distingu^s. 

Le  Maire  de  Sens, 

S^nateur  de  I'Yonne, 

(Signed)     Lucien  Cornet. 
k  Sir  Lees  Knowles,  Bart. 


29 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

[translation]. 

Maitre  Corot,  notary,  of  Sens,  has  just  informed  me  that  Monsieur 
Michaut,  Maitre  de  Conferences  at  the  Sorbonne,  who  lives  at  35  Rue 
des  Imberg^res,  Sceaux  (Seine),  has  instructed  him,  in  the  name  of  the 
Saint-Denis  family,  to  allow  the  will  of  Monsieur  Saint-Denis  to  be 
photographed,  so  far  as  it  has  no  family  and  confidential  character, 
that  is  to  say,  in  particular,  the  detailed  list  of  the  articles  which  belonged 
to  Napoleon,  the  date  of  the  will  and  the  signature.  Mattre  Corot  is 
at  your  service  for  this  operation. 

Monsieur  Michaut  has  asked  Mattre  Corot  to  tell  you  that  Monsieur 
Saint-Denis  left  some  memoirs  which  the  family  propose  to  publish 
after  the  war,  and  he  would  be  very  grateful  if  you  would  communicate 
to  him  any  details  that  you  may  have  discovered  touching  M.  Saint- 
Denis. 

I  suggest  that  you  enter  into  communication  with  Maitre  Corot, 
notary,  51  Rue  de  la  R6publique,  Sens. 


The  Mayor    of    Sens,    Senator    of    I'Yonne, 
(Signed)  Lucien    Cornet. 


To  Sir  Lees  Knowles,  Bart. 


Photographie  Alsacienne, 
Ancienne  Maison  E.  Baudoin, 

M.  Provost  successeur, 
6,  rue  du  Palais-de-Justice, 

Sens  (Yonne), 

le  2  Octobre,  1917. 
Monsieur, 

Par  suite  k  I'entretien  que  j'ai  eu  avec  M®  Corot  au  sujet  du 
travail  que  vous  m'avez  demand^,  je  ne  suis  autoris6  a  reproduire  que 
deux  documents. 

Je  me  suis  permis  de  faire  deux  cliches,  car  M®  Corot  ne  peut  se 
dessaisir  du  testament,  et  devant  assister  a  la  reproduction  n'^tait  libre 
qu'aujourdhui. 

Je  pense  arriver  a  un  bon  resultat,  et  j'esp^re  vous  donner 
satisfaction. 

(Signed)     P.  M.  Provost. 
F.  Provost. 
To  Sir  Lees  Knowles,  Bart. 


30 


/ 


>*'V<*'»-i*_     ■>  «.«A».;**ac:::> 


/ 


(U-*^. 


^ 


•/' 


«*^     'V«V'«C»»1.-W>-    ^^    M^.    tf'^f**.*^'     ^L^    tJyl^^^./,-,       (^     ♦^'^     i,..»xt.i*^,.^j 


^k— iSV«»<:     t-*-*t.»-4„'«^/E^.;%— ,    -v^*-  -■ 


i/^      i 


-/^•.t^   -i>^    4.,^^9^*^tA^      -4^-*^^.    '«->7^'  ^^^-A*.*^     •  T>* 


A  Pao;e  from  the  Will  of  St.  Denis. 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

[translation]. 

As  the  result  of  the  conversation  which  I  have  had  with  Maitre 
Corot  on  the  subject  of  the  work  which  you  have  asked  of  me,  I  am 
authorized  to  reproduce  only  two  documents. 

I  have  taken  upon  myself  to  make  two  negatives  :  Maitre  Corot, 
not  being  able  to  give  up  possession  of  the  will,  and  being  obliged  to  be 
present  at  the  reproduction,  was  not  free  until  to-day. 

I  expect  to  arrive  at  a  good  result,  and  I  hope  to  give  you  satisfaction. 

(Signed)     P.  M.  Provost. 
F.  Provost. 

To  Sir  Lees  Knowles,  Bart. 


Sens, 

le  3  Octobre,  1917. 
Monsieur, 

J'ai  I'honneur  de  vous  aviser  que  j'ai  mis  a  la  disposition  de  M. 
Provost,  photographe,  hier,  le  testament  de  Monsieur  Saint-Denis,  et 
que  la  photographie  de  la  partie  autorisee  de  ce  testament  a  6t6  faite. 
J'esp^re  qu'elle  vous  donnera  satisfaction. 
Veuillez  agr^er,  Monsieur,  I'assurance  de  mes  sentiments  distingu^s. 

(Signed)     Alexandre  Corot. 

k  Sir  Lees  Knowles,  Bart. 


[translation]. 

I  have  the  honour  to  inform  you  that  yesterday  I  placed  the  will 
of  Monsieur  Saint-Denis  at  the  service  of  Monsieur  Provost,  photographer, 
and  that  the  negative  of  the  part  of  the  will  authorized  has  been  made. 

I  hope  this  will  give  you  satisfaction. 

*      *      *      * 

(Signed)  Alexandre  Corot. 
To  Sir  Lees  Knowles,  Bart. 


31 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

The  following  is  a  transcript,  with  a  translation,  from  the  will  of 
St.  Denis  : — 

Les  objets  ci-apr^s  seront  offerts  a  la  ville  de  Sens  : 

1"  L'habit  de  I'Empereur  garni  des  epaulettes  et  de  la  plaque  de  la 
Legion  d'honneur,  mes  enfants  feront  f aire  une  montre  vitree  pour  la 
soutenir. 

2°  La  cocarde  de  I'un  des  chapeaux  de  I'Empereur,  celle-ci  sera  mise 
sous  verre  dans  un  petit  cadre. 

3°  Les  deux  volumes  de  M.  Fleuri  de  Chaboulon  (cet  ouvrage  dont  les 
marges  sont  couvertes  de  notes  au  crayon  de  la  main  de  I'Empereur 
avait  appartenu  a  Sir  Hudson  Lowe),  et  celui  de  la  bataille  de  Waterloo. 
Cet  exemplaire  fut  envoys  k  I'Empereur  par  le  docteur  O'Meara.  Sa 
Majesty  en  avait  donn6  la  manuscrit  au  docteur  lors  du  depart  de 
celui-ci  pour  I'Europe  et  I'avait  charg^  de  le  faire  imprimer.  Les 
quelques  changements  ou  corrections  toutes  au  crayon  sont  de  la 
main  de  I'Empereur. 

4°  Les  deux  atlas  sur  les  cartes  desquels  il-y-a  des  traces  ou  calculs,  etc., 
au  crayon  qui  sont  de  la  main  de  I'Empereur.  Pour  faire  ses  dictees 
sur  les  campagnes  d'ltalie  il  s'est  fr^quemment  servi  de  I'atlas  d'ltalie. 

5°  Le  volume  in  folio  des  campagnes  d'ltalie,  cet  ouvrage  fut  envoy^ 
a  I'Empereur  par  Lady  Holland. 

6°  et  enfin,  le  morceau  du  Cercueil  de  I'Empereur,  et  le  morceau  du 
tronc  de  I'un  des  saules  qui  ombrageaient  la  tombe  en  1840. 

Je  prie  M.  Murin  de  se  charger  d'offrir  ces  differ ents  objets  pour 
qu'ils  prennent  place  dans  la  biblioth^que-mus^e  de  la  ville. 

Mes  filles  devront  toujours  se  rappeler  que  I'Empereur  fut  mon 
bienfaiteur  et  par  consequent  le  leur  :  la  plus  grande  partie  de  ce  que 
je  possdde  je  le  dois  k  ses  bont^s. 

Je  prie  M.  Murin,  mon  gendre,  d'accepter  les  fonctions  d'Ex^cuteur 
testamentaire. 

Fait  k  Sens  le  six  Juillet  mil  huit  cent  cinquante-cinq. 

St.  Denis. 

Sign6  et  paraph^  par  nous  President  du  Tribunal  civil  de  Sens,  et  par 
le  greffier,  au  desir  de  notre  proems  verbal  de  ce  jour. 

Sens,  le  quatre  mai  mil  huit  cent  cinquante  six. 

Coubard. 
Cornethier. 
Enregistr^  k  Sens  le  huit  Mai,  1856. 


82 


-/■■ 


■-  -> 


u>>*y-i. 


"V' 


/  1  .1..       /^    6i    f^-^'l"^-   f^/^'-  /"' 

.        // 


7.^ 


The  last  page  with  the  Signature. 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

[translation]. 

The  following  articles  are  to  be  offered  to  the  town  of  Sens  : — 

Ist.  The  Emperor's  coat  ornamented  with  the  epaulettes  and  the  star  of 
the  Legion  of  Honour.  My  children  should  have  a  glass  case 
made  to  contain  it. 

2nd.  The  cockade  of  one  of  the  Emperor's  hats,  this  to  be  put  under 
glass  in  a  small  frame. 

3rd.  The  two  books  by  M.  Fleuri  de  Chaboulon  (this  work,  the  margins 
of  which  are  covered  with  pencil-notes  in  the  Emperor's  handwriting, 
formerly  belonged  to  Sir  Hudson  Lowe),  and  the  one  of  the  Battle 
of  Waterloo,  this  copy  having  been  sent  to  the  Emperor  by  Doctor 
O'Meara.  His  Majesty  had  given  the  manuscript  of  this  work  to 
the  Doctor  before  his  departure  for  Europe,  and  had  commanded 
him  to  have  it  printed.  The  various  alterations  and  corrections 
in  pencil  are  in  the  Emperor's  hand. 

4th.  The  two  atlases,  on  the  maps  of  which  there  are  marks  and  calcula- 
tions, etc.,  in  pencil  which  are  in  the  Emperor's  hand.  In  his  dicta- 
tions about  the  campaigns  in  Italy,  he  availed  himself  frequently 
of  the  map  of  Italy. 

5th.  The  folio  volume  of  the  campaigns  in  Italy  :  this  work  was  sent  to 
the  Emperor  by  Lady  Holland. 

6th  and  last,  a  piece  of  the  Emperor's  coffin,  and  a  piece  of  the  trunk 
of  one  of  the  willow-trees  which  shaded  the  grave  in  1840. 

I  beg  M.  Murin  to  accept  the  duty  of  offering  these  several  articles, 
in  order  that  they  may  find  a  resting-place  in  the  Library-museum  of  the 
town. 

My  daughters  must  ever  remember  that  the  Emperor  was  my 
benefactor,  and  consequently  theirs,  also  :  the  greater  part  of  what  I 
possess,  I  owe  to  his  generosity. 

I  beg  M.  Murin,  my  son-in-law,  to  accept  the  executorship  of  my  will. 

Made  at  Sens  the  6th  July,  1856. 

St.  Denis. 

Signed  and  initialled  by  us  :  the  President  of  the  Civil  Court  of 
Sens,  and  by  the  Clerk  in  accordance  with  our  proceedings  of  this  day. 

Sens,  the  4th  May,   1856. 

Coubard. 
Cornethier. 
Registered  at  Sens  the  8th  May,  1856.     - 


33 


CHAPTER    IV, 
MARCHAND  AND  ST.  DENIS. 

The  following  sketch  is  drawn  mainly  from  two  well-known  books, 
"  Napoleon  a  Sainte-H^l^ne  ",  by  Fr^d^ric  Masson,  and  "  Apr^s  la  mort 
de  I'Empereur  ",  by  Alb^ric  Cahuet. 

Napoleon,  at  the  age  of  forty-five,  escaped  from  the  Isle  of  Elba 
on  February  20th,  1815,  and,  about  a  month  later,  he  entered  Paris. 
Then  began  a  third  period  of  imperialism,  known  as  the  Hundred  Days, 
which  lasted  from  March  13th  to  June  22nd.  During  those  days, 
the  servants  of  Elba  retained  their  positions  at  the  Tuileries,  and  at  the 
Elys^e.  Later,  when  Napoleon  embarked  for  St.  Helena,  the  English 
allowed  only  fifteen  servants  to  embark  with  him,  and  more  than  half 
of  them  had  been  with  the  Emperor  in  the  Isle.  At  St.  Helena,  his 
household  was  under  the  chief  direction  of  Count  Bertrand,  who  held  the 
appointment  of  Grand  Marshal  which  he  had  held  previously,  and  two 
of  its  humblest  members  were  Marchand  and  St.  Denis  :  to  write  of 
one  of  them  would  be  impossible  without  alluding  to  his  intimate 
connection  with  the  other,  and  of  their  intimate  connection  with  Count 
Bertrand. 

The  name  of  Marchand  has  fixed  itself  in  history  as  part  of  the  legend 
of  St.  Helena  ;  but,  Bertrand  and  Marchand  do  not  represent  at  all  the 
same  personalities.  Bertrand  was  always  the  military  aristocrat,  the 
high  personage,  whereas  Marchand,  of  much  humbler  position,  raised 
himself  by  his  assiduity  above  his  station  :  for  the  Emperor,  a  prisoner 
and  sick,  Marchand  was  a  confidant,  and  it  is  in  the  name  of  a  friend, 
more  glorious  than  a  title  of  nobility,  that  Napoleon  hands  him  down 
to  history  in  his  will.  Napoleon  bore  towards  Marchand  such  a 
friendship  as  Queen  Victoria  bore  towards  her  faithful  servant,  John 
Brown.  One  day.  Napoleon,  before  whom  Bertrand  himself  could  not 
hide  his  weariness  in  exile,  said  to  Marchand,  "  They  will  all  go.  You 
alone  will  stay  with  me  and  close  my  eyes  ". 

The  wind  and  wet  weather  of  St.  Helena  were  almost  proverbial  : 
the  silk  stuffs,  the  uniforms,  the  gloves,  things  in  general,  although 


34 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

placed  in  well-fitting  boxes,  were  eaten  quickly  with  reddish  spots  which 
could  not  be  removed,  leather  was  covered  over  in  a  few  days  with  a 
mass  of  mouldiness.  It  was  hard  work  protecting  the  wardrobe  of  the 
Emperor  from  these  injuries,  and,  had  it  not  been  for  the  religious  care  of 
Marchand,  the  red  velvet-dress  of  the  consul,  used  for  grand  ceremonies, 
and  the  cloak  of  Marengo,  etc.,  would  have  become  soon  a  lamentable 
mass  of  rags. 

Napoleon  died  at  St.  Helena  on  Saturday,  May  5th,  and  he  was 
buried  on  Wednesday,  May  9th,  1821 — one  hundred  years  ago.  Seventeen 
days  after  the  burial  of  the  Emperor,  the  French  colony  was  in  a  state 
of  departure.  Under  the  direction  of  Count  Montholon,  and  the 
immediate  care  of  Marchand,  a  commencement  was  made,  the  day  after 
the  funeral,  of  packing  the  transportable  furniture,  the  valuable  plate, 
a  great  part  of  the  books,  all  the  wardrobe  of  the  exile,  the  faded  uniforms, 
and  the  eagle-liveries,  which  would  no  longer  be  of  use.  Piously,  and 
with  a  thousand  attentions,  had  been  shut  up  in  their  travelling-shrines, 
the  body-linen  and  the  arms  of  the  great  dead,  his  Austerlitz-sword,  his 
pistols,  his  spurs,  intended  for  his  son,  the  lace  to  be  delivered  to  his  wife, 
and  the  other  keepsakes  to  be  distributed  among  the  Imperial  family. 

On  August  23rd,  1821,  Louis-Joseph-Narcisse  Marchand,  ex-valet 
of  the  Emperor,  presented  himself  at  the  office  of  the  police-authorities 
in  Paris,  and  asked  for  a  passport  to  Auxerre.  Marchand  was  then  thirty 
years  of  age,  intelligent,  handsome,  and  courteous.  In  Paris,  he  was 
anxious  to  avoid  all  compromising  curiosity,  at  the  same  time,  during  the 
whole  of  his  stay  there,  he  was  never,  for  a  single  step,  left  by  the  police. 
The  first  care  of  Marchand,  after  joining  his  mother  at  Auxerre,  was  to 
acquire  near  that  town  a  country-house  with  a  little  land,  the  Verger 
estate,  in  the  Commune  of  Perrigny  :  he  was  not  without  means. 
Napoleon,  on  his  death-bed,  had  authorised  him  to  dispose  of  the 
necklace,  which  the  Queen  Hortense  had  handed  to  her  stepfather  at 
the  time  of  his  departure  from  Malmaison,  and,  according  to  the  estimate 
of  the  Emperor,  it  was  worth  200,000  francs,  or  £8,000.  "  Hide  it  on  your 
person  ",  the  dying  man  charged  him  :  "  I  give  it  to  you.  I  do  not  know 
in  what  state  my  affairs  are  in  Europe  :  it  is  the  only  thing  of  value  of 
which  I  am  able  to  dispose.  It  will  enable  you  to  wait  for  the  provision 
that  I  am  making  for  you  in  my  will  and  codicil  ".  But,  already  by  his 
own  economies,  Louis  Marchand  was  able  to  set  himself  up  in  the  country, 
without  waiting  for  the  probate  of  the  Imperial  will,  which  assured  to 
him  a  fortune  of  500,000  francs,  or  £20,000.  Auxerre  is  only  175  kilo- 
metres, or  about  105  miles,  from  the  capital. 


35 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

He  took  care  not  to  join  any  secret  society.  A  note  of  the  Prefecture 
states  that,  during  his  visits  to  Paris,  he  did  not  see  anyone  except  the 
Generals  Bertrand  and  Montholon,  executors  like  himself  of  the  will 
of  Napoleon.  However,  he  had  to  make  the  acquaintance  of  an  old 
soldier  of  the  Empire — General  Brayer — to  whose  house  Montholon 
one  day  took  him,  and  the  returning  of  this  visit  had  a  decisive  effect 
upon  the  destiny  of  the  former  valet  of  the  Emperor.  Montholon  might 
well  show  some  kindness  to  the  servant  whom  Napoleon  himself,  in  his 
will,  deigned  to  call  his  friend,  and  to  whom  he  had  been  willing  to 
transfer,  as  a  truly  Imperial  evidence  of  his  gratitude,  the  necklace  of 
Queen  Hortense,  charging  him,  under  the  same  title  as  Bertrand,  and 
Montholon  himself,  with  the  execution  of  his  last  wishes.  "  Marry 
honourably  ",  he  had  said  to  him,  towards  the  end,  "  make  your  choice 
among  the  daughters  of  the  officers,  or  soldiers,  of  my  Old  Guard  :  there 
are  many  of  these  good  fellows  who  are  not  happy  ".  Brayer  was  one. 
In  short,  the  valet  was  well-received  by  the  General  :  marriage  was 
discussed,  and  Marchand,  on  November  15th,  1823,  married  the  young 
Michelle-Mathilde  Brayer  who,  in  the  month  of  September  in  the 
following  year,  presented  him  with  a  daughter. 

And  now  we  see  Marchand,  thanks  to  his  marriage,  admitted 
into  one  of  the  families  of  the  Imperial  aristocracy.  But,  in  reality, 
it  was  only  in  the  reign  of  Napoleon  III.  that  he  received  the 
right  to  appear  among  the  Imperial  arms-bearers  :  till  then,  the  will  of 
St.  Helena  had  been  executed  only  in  part  ;  for,  it  needed  no  less  than 
three  changes  of  Government  for  the  execution  of  the  Emperor's  last 
wishes.  So,  the  "  Count  "  Marchand,  son-in-law  of  the  General  of 
Division  Count  Brayer,  peer  of  France  of  the  Hundred  Days,  took  rank, 
in  consequence  of  his  marriage,  in  the  world  of  Imperial  aristocracy. 
But,  his  mission  to  execute  the  will  of  Napoleon,  in  conjunction  with 
Counts  Bertrand  and  Montholon,  helped  to  make  him  a  still  more 
notable  personage  of  this  Society. 

To  the  King  of  Rome,  Napoleon  left  only  some  personal  keepsakes, 
and  it  was  Marchand  who  was  the  custodian  of  the  largest  number  of 
them.  At  the  end  of  May,  1822,  the  executors  were  informed  that  they 
would  not  be  permitted  to  see  again  their  former  royal  mistress,  Marie- 
Louise  the  ex-Empress,  who  was  in  Austria.  In  May,  1827,  Marchand, 
who  desired  most  strongly  to  fulfil  the  mission  which  was  assigned  to 
him,  showed  an  intention  of  going  to  Vienna  to  transmit  to  the  hands  of 
the  Duke  of  Reichstadt  the  different  keepsakes  which  had  been  entrusted 
to  him  ;  but,  the  Austrian  cabinet  did  not  think  it  desirable  to  give  him 
permission  to  go  there.      On  March  18th,  1832,  Marchand  determined 


36 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

to  write  direct  to  the  Duke  of  Reichstadt  :  but,  he  received  no  satisfaction, 
and  so  the  King  of  Rome  did  not  receive  any  of  the  pious  keepsakes 
intended  for  him  by  the  august  victim. 

The  revolution  of  July,  1830,  in  sweeping  away  the  throne  of  the 
Bourbons,  must  have  changed  again  considerably  Marchand's  life,  as  well 
as  that  of  his  family-in-law.  Louis-Philippe,  made  King,  collected  all  those 
who  had  served  with  so  much  glory  under  the  Emperor.  The  command 
of  the  Polytechnic  School  was  offered  to  General  Bertrand.  General 
Brayer  was  re-instated  in  the  active  duties  of  his  rank,  as  General  of 
Division,  and  given  a  command  at  Strasbourg,  whither  he  took  his  family 
and  his  son-in-law.  The  Government  of  Louis  PhUippe,  on  the  initiative 
of  Monsieur  Thiers,  negotiated  with  England  for  the  return  to  France 
of  the  ashes  of  the  prisoner  of  St,  Helena.  Lord  Palmerston  brought  the 
proposal  before  Parliament  in  June,  1840,  and  it  was  adopted  with 
enthusiasm.  The  translation  of  the  body  moved  the  heart  of  France, 
and  everybody  wanted  to  go  to  St.  Helena.  In  what  capacity  could 
Marchand  accompany  the  expedition?      That  was  a  knotty  question. 

By  the  desire  of  the  Emperor,  his  social  position  had  been  changed, 
and  there  was  a  difficulty  in  adjusting  matters.  "  Marchand  agrees  to 
accompany  the  mission  ",  writes  in  her  diary  the  Duchess  de  Dino, 
"  on  condition  that  he  eats  at  the  table  of  the  Prince  de  Joinville  : 
to  satisfy  him,  he  has  been  appointed  captain  of  the  staff  of  the  national 
guard,  and  he  is  going,  and  he  will  eat  at  the  table  of  the  prince  ".  It 
was  nevertheless  not  quite  so,  and  the  servant  of  Napoleon  was  not,  as  a 
fact,  one  of  the  regular  messmates  of  the  son  of  Louis  Philippe.  It  was 
arranged  that  Marchand  should  embark  not  on  the  frigate  Belle-Poule, 
but  on  the  convoy-corvette  La  Favorite,  and,  as  he  had  been  given  an 
epaulette  of  lieutenant  in  the  national  guard,  his  rank  allowed  him  to 
sit  at  the  table  of  the  commander,  and  on  occasions  at  that  of  the  leader 
of  the  expedition.  Marchand  took  part  in  the  last  sad  scene,  more 
profoundly  impressed  than  all  the  others. 

The  Journal  des  D^bats,  on  November  29th,  1840,  announced  the 
death  on  the  previous  evening  in  Paris  of  Lieutenant-General  the  Count 
de  Brayer.  He  had  not  been  able  to  kneel  before  the  coffin  of  Napoleon, 
with  all  the  other  generals,  and  Marshal  Soult  at  their  head.  Moreover, 
if  the  good  old  man  had  lived  a  few  weeks  longer,  he  would  have  had  the 
pleasure  of  hearing  that  his  son-in-law,  Marchand,  had  received  from 
King  Louis-PhUippe  the  cross  of  the  Legion  of  Honour. 

Marchand  was  treated  justly.  Napoleon  III.  bestowed  upon  him 
the  title  of  Count,  which,  with  a  coat  of  arms,  was  confirmed  by  letters 
patent  on  AprU  7th,  1869.    In  1853,  a  commission  was  appointed  specially 


37 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

to  examine  questions  relating  to  the  execution  of  the  will  of  St.  Helena, 
when  Marchand  received  213,980  francs,  or  upwards  of  £8,500,  the  heir 
of  Brayer,  32,218  francs,  or  about  £1,300. 

On  April  2nd,  1861,  on  the  occasion  of  the  removal  of  the  remains 
of  the  Emperor  to  the  new  crypt  in  the  dome  of  Les  Invalides,  Count 
Marchand,  the  sole  survivor  of  the  executors  of  the  will  of  Napoleon, 
was  made  an  officer  of  the  Legion  of  Honour.  As  he  had  no  male  descen- 
dant, his  son-in-law,  M.  Edouard  Desmazieres,  who  had  married  his 
only  daughter  in  1845,  was  authorised  by  Napoleon  III.  to  take  up 
the  arms  and  the  title  of  his  father-in-law. 

The  first  valet  of  St.  Helena  survived  to  the  second  Empire,  and  knew 
of  the  disaster  at  Sedan,  after  having  been  present  at  that  of  Waterloo. 
On  June  21st,  1876,  a  short  obituary  notice  in  the  Figaro  announced, 
without  comment,  that  the  obsequies  of  "  Monsieur  the  Count  Marchand, 
late  executor  of  the  will  of  the  Emperor  Napoleon  I.",  would  take  place 
the  following  Thursday  punctually  at  noon  in  the  Church  of  Sainte- 
Clotilde.  Countess  Marchand,  daughter  of  General  Brayer,  who  was 
fourteen  years  younger  than  her  husband,  saw  the  Ministry  of  Gambetta, 
and  died  in  1881. 

The  father  of  Louis-Etienne  Saint-Denis  was  employed  in  the  stables 
of  Louis  XVI.,  whose  livery  he  wore.  He  saw  the  reign  come  to  an  end, 
but  his  insignificance  spared  him  from  the  revolutionary  reprisals  against 
all  those  who  had  supported  the  King,  and,  when  new  masters  were 
installed  at  the  Tuileries,  old  Saint-Denis  approached  the  new  powers 
and  had  the  good  fortune  to  be  re-appointed  as  outrider  (piqueur).  At 
the  same  time,  he  succeeded  in  obtaining  a  promise  from  the  Grand 
Coachman,  Coulaincourt,  that  his  son  should  be  engaged,  and,  when 
young  Saint-Denis  was  admitted  as  a  pupil  in  the  stables,  in  1806,  he  was 
just  18  years  of  age.  This  was  a  great  change  for  him,  as  from  the  age  of 
thirteen  or  fourteen  he  had  been  learning  the  duties  of  a  junior  clerk 
in  a  notary's  office. 

The  apprentice-outrider  was  a  fine  youth,  tall,  well-made,  of  pleasant 
appearance,  and  he  adapted  himself  quickly  to  his  modest  duties  in 
connection  with  the  care  of  horses.  He  made  journeys  to  Germany, 
Spain,  Holland,  etc.  :  he  was  with  all  the  escorts,  and  then,  on  returning 
to  Paris,  he  learned  that  he  was  to  be  attached  to  the  person  of  Napoleon. 

It  was  in  December  of  1811  that  the  Emperor  wished  to  add  to  the 
famous  Roustan,  a  second  mameluke,  and,  on  the  advice  of  the  Grand 
Coachman,  who  had  continued  his  interest  in  young  St.  Denis,  he 
transformed  his  outrider  to  mameluke,  changing  his  name  from 
Saint-Denis  to  the  more  oriental  one  of  Ali,  which  had  been  borne  by  an 


38 


'V 


Letter  of  Marchand  tl 


9^  .X2  0^  /^ 


'brother  of  Napoleon. 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

Egyptian,  an  ugly  man  of  quick  temper,  formerly  in  the  service  of  the 
Emperor.  This  was  truly  good  fortune  to  become  mameluke  to  the 
Emperor,  armour-bearer  of  the  hero,  and  guardian  of  his  sleep,  with  the 
right  of  spending  the  night  lying  across  his  threshold.  During  the  next 
three  years,  until  1814,  St.  Denis  M^as  in  the  background,  acquitting 
himself,  however,  very  correctly  in  his  new  service.  He  followed  his 
master  to  the  war,  slept  at  his  feet  in  the  tent,  galloped  behind  him  among 
the  troops  carrying  his  field-telescope,  and  a  silver  flask  filled  with  spirit, 
which  was  intended  for  the  wounded  met  on  the  way,  the  Emperor 
never  using  it  himself.  When  Napoleon  wished  to  watch  some  particular 
movement  in  the  course  of  a  battle,  Ali  placedhimself  before  him  with  the 
large  end  of  the  telescope  on  his  shoulder.  He  took  part  in  the  terrible 
campaign  in  Russia,  and  in  the  retreat.  After  the  passage  of  the  Rhine, 
he  was  obliged  to  stay  at  Mayence,  and  he  was  unable  to  leave  that 
town  until  after  the  entry  of  the  Allies  into  Paris,  and  the  abdication  of 
the  Emperor.  Then,  there  were  many  desertions  from  the  household, 
and  that  of  Roustan  enabled  the  second  mameluke  to  advance  a  step. 
Ali  missed  the  departure  of  Napoleon  from  Fontainebleau. 
Proceeding,  however,  by  some  days  the  departure  of  Countess  Bertrand, 
he  disembarked  at  Porto-Ferrajo  in  the  Island  of  Elba,  one  month  after 
the  Imperial  establishment,  when  he  was  able  to  take  up  again  his  duties 
for  his  Sovereign.  The  Imperial  equipage  was  constantly  on  the  move, 
as  Napoleon  tried  to  dissipate  the  force  of  his  terrible  activity  by  continual 
movement  :  he  was  not  yet  the  idle  recluse  of  St.  Helena  :  he  opened 
seldom  the  books  which  he  had  brought  in  his  baggage  from  Fontainebleau. 
St.  Denis,  during  the  journeys  across  the  island,  sat  constantly 
by  the  side  of  the  coachman,  when  the  first  valet,  Marchand,  was  not 
of  the  party.  He  saw  nothing  of  books  upon  the  Island  of  Elba.  After 
the  disembarkation  in  the  Gulf  of  Joiian,  in  1815,  St.  Denis  was  near 
Napoleon  in  all  the  historic  scenes,  he  heard  the  delirious  acclamations  of 
the  peasantry,  and  of  the  soldiers,  and  he  entered  Paris  with  Napoleon 
on  the  evening  of  March  20th.  He  resumed  office  first  at  the  Tuileries, 
and  then  at  the  Elys^e,  during  the  Hundred  Days,  while  the  constitutional 
Empire  lasted.  The  former  household  was  re-established  in  all  its 
grandeur,  and  many  were  the  solicitations  to  be  granted  former  appoint- 
ments. In  June,  St.  Denis  rejoined  the  army,  with  the  baggage.  He  was 
constantly  near  the  Emperor  at  the  Battles  of  Ligny  and  Waterloo,  and 
he  returned  with  his  fallen  master  to  the  filys^e.  He  accompanied 
Napoleon  then  to  Malmaison,  where  the  servants,  under  the  feverish 
orders  of  the  Grand-Marshal  Bertrand,  and  the  supervision  of  the  first 
valet  Marchand,  were  preparing  hastily  the  Imperial  baggage  for  an 


39 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

unknown  destination.  The  Emperor,  who  foresaw  and  dreaded  the  cruel 
inactivity  of  a  far-off  exile,  desired  to  take  with  him  books,  many  books, 
a  whole  library  of  works.  There  were  works  collected  at  the  Imperial 
libraries  of  the  Tuileries,  the  Trianon,  Rambouillet,  and  Compi^gne, 
and  his  field-library.  From  these  the  Emperor  drew  largely,  and  in 
1814,  he  had  taken  a  portion  of  the  Fontainebleau  books  to  Elba,  where 
they  are  preserved  in  the  Communal  library,  at  the  town-hall  of  Porto- 
Ferrajo,  at  the  present  time,  and  are  treasured  by  the  people  of  the  island. 
Bliicher,  when  he  knew  the  intention  of  Napoleon,  sent  a  party  of  horse- 
men to  oppose  the  transfer  of  the  books,  which  he  desired  doubtless  to 
keep  for  Louis  XVIII.  These  soldiers  did  not  arrive  until  after  the 
departure  of  the  first  carriage  :  so  that,  out  of  1,920  volumes,  550 
followed  in  Napoleon's  baggage,  and  were  taken  on  board  the 
"  Northumberland  ",  as  the  foundation  of  the  exile's  library. 

The  memorialists  of  St.  Helena  have  told  us  of  the  tedium  of 
Longwood,  where  the  restrained  and  supervised  existence  of  the  prisoners 
was  terribly  monotonous.  In  the  morning,  the  Emperor  hardly  ever 
went  out.  In  the  afternoon,  about  2  o'clock,  he  took,  fairly  regularly 
in  the  early  days,  an  English  lesson  with  Las  Cases  :  afterwards,  he 
walked  in  the  poor  garden,  where  sometimes,  but  very  rarely,  presenta- 
tions were  made  to  him  :  then,  he  drove  for  a  short  distance  in  a  carriage, 
with  great  state,  and  with  Ali,  in  green  and  gold,  as  outrider  at  the  head 
of  the  team  of  six  horses.  Before  the  evening  meal,  the  Emperor  either 
dictated,  or  revised,  at  first  with  Las  Cases,  the  campaigns  in  Italy  or 
Egypt.  It  was  necessary  to  follow  him  word  for  word  :  so,  Las  Cases 
was  obliged  to  invent,  for  his  own  use,  a  sort  of  hieroglyphic  writing,  a 
kind  of  shorthand,  and  later,  he  himself  dictated  what  he  had  noted  to 
his  son,  Emmanuel,  who  was  obliged  soon  to  replace  his  father 
in  Napoleon's  service,  when  the  bad  state  of  the  eyes  of  Las  Cases 
rendered  the  work  too  difiicult.  Another  gratuitous  copyist  did  not 
delay  in  offering  himself,  and  in  making  himself  useful,  one  who  having 
passed  from  the  stable  to  the  house,  passed  from  the  house  to  the 
archives.  At  first,  St.  Denis  began  by  putting  in  order  the  pages  of  the 
memoirs  which  Las  Cases  had  written  out  from  day  to  day.  Every  time, 
says  Las  Cases,  that  the  Emperor  entered  my  room,  he  saw  there  the 
faithful  Ali  in  his  spare  moments  recopying  this  journal.  Each  day, 
unless  he  was  required  for  carriage-work,  or  in  the  Emperor's  bedroom, 
he  occupied  himself  in  classifying  and  arranging  the  books,  the  returns 
and  the  withdrawals,  and  he  made,  without  doubt  by  Montholon's 
suggestion,  a  systematic  catalogue  ;  so  that,  although  the  library  was  not 
a  large  one,  the  duties  of  librarian  were  no  sinecure.     First,  he  had  to 


40 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

wait  upon  the  Emperor,  who  wanted  always  a  considerable  number  of 
books  to  be  brought  to  him  at  the  same  time.  If  one  of  these  works 
interested  him  especially,  he  covered  its  margins  with  notes.  Everything 
which  offered  any  degree  of  utility  was,  even  after  being  read  carefully, 
put  aside.  The  Emperor  would  allow  no  volume  to  be  mislaid.  At 
Malmaison,  at  Fontainebleau,  and  at  the  Trianon,  a  book,  after  being 
entered  in  the  catalogue,  was  marked  with  a  stamp  bearing  the  words 
"  Cabinet  of  the  Emperor  ".  At  Longwood,  this  stamp  was  replaced 
by  a  seal  daubed  with  ink,  or  by  a  wax-impression,  in  which  the  Imperial 
arms  might  be  faintly  distinguished.  In  the  classification  of  the  book- 
cases, the  Emperor  insisted  upon  absolute  methodical  order.  M. 
Frederic  Masson  says,  "A  book,  which  he  had  once  seen  and  read,  never 
went  out  of  his  memor3^  If  the  librarian  could  not  find  it  at  once, 
Napoleon  would  describe  minutely  the  binding,  the  colour  of  the  back 
and  sides,  point  out  the  position  where  the  book  should  have  been, 
and  on  which  shelf  it  should  be  found.  To  the  green  library,  St.  Denis 
had  to  welcome  also  all  the  Emperor's  companions,  each  one  of  the 
captivity  in  search  of  a  book  to  read.  Gourgaud  asked  for  books  on 
military  history,  Bertrand  chose  novels  for  his  wife,  Montholon,  especially, 
paid  frequent  visits  to  St.  Denis,  "  I  am  the  despair  of  Ali  ",  he  wrote 
to  his  Countess,  on  August  11th,  1819  :  "he  pretends  that  I  have 
out  more  than  a  hundred  volumes,  and  that  I  never  bring  back  a  book. 
This  is  true  ;  but,  I  pay  no  attention  to  him  ".  This  carelessness, 
however,  did  not  always  make  the  good  fellow  laugh,  for  he  took  his 
responsibility  as  custodian  of  the  books  very  seriously,  and  he  tried  above 
all  to  avoid  the  Emperor's  greatly-dreaded  fits  of  impatience.  To  tell 
the  truth,  this  library,  commencing  with  600  volumes  collected  hastily, 
in  which  materials  for  study  appeared  in  very  small  numbers  was  quite 
insufficient  to  occupy  the  leisure  of  the  exile.  So,  during  the  voyage 
of  the  "  Northumberland  "  from  Portsmouth  to  St.  Helena,  Napoleon 
took  advantage  of  a  call  at  Madeira  to  make  out  a  carefully  prepared 
list,  and  to  request  the  English  Government  to  order  the  books  to  be  sent 
to  him,  payable  on  delivery.  But,  these  volumes  did  not  arrive  at 
Longwood  until  June,  1816.  Until  then,  he  contented  himself  with  what 
he  had.  After  dinner,  when  he  did  not  play  cards,  he  read.  Truly 
monotonous  were  those  evenings  at  St.  Helena,  in  the  wretched  light 
of  a  few  candles — for  the  Government  was  parsimonious  about  wax 
and  candles — in  the  wretched  room,  covered  with  a  yellow  paper  with 
a  terrible  pattern  of  green  flowers  !  There,  however,  the  men  wore 
uniform  or  Court-dress,  and  the  Countesses  Bertrand  and  Montholon 
made  an  effort  at  dressing,  very  difficult  of  success  in  this  isolation. 


41 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

On  May  21st,  1816,  Napoleon  received  an  English  publication, 
reproducing  the  official  notes  found  in  the  portfolio,  which  had  been  taken 
with  the  Imperial  carriage  by  the  English  at  Waterloo.  After  this, 
the  parcels  were  more  regular,  frequent,  and  complete.  Every  three  or 
four  weeks,  he  received  a  large  packet  of  European  journals,  and  you  may 
judge  with  what  energy  they  were  perused  !  At  the  end  of  June,  1816, 
the  books  ordered  in  Madeira  arrived.  The  wishes  of  the  Emperor  had 
not  been  very  carefully  followed  :  there  were  missing  a  good  number  of 
recent  works  that  the  Emperor  would  have  liked  to  possess.  The  parcels, 
rare  at  first,  numerous  at  the  end  of  the  captivity,  arrived  without  order, 
or  method.  Such  as  it  was,  however,  the  Longwood  library  answered 
to  the  needs  of  the  little  colony.  The  Emperor  was  not  the  only 
one  to  use  it.  Everyone  came  to  borrow  from  it.  Useless  books  certainly 
had  poured  in  ;  but,  the  variety  of  the  volumes  sent  to  Napoleon 
had  the  great  advantage  of  offering  to  each  of  his  companions 
reading-matter  in  accordance  with  his  tastes  and  temperament  :  for,  in 
this  library  of  the  exile,  there  was  something  of  everything,  science  and 
literature,  almanacs,  histories,  newspapers,  maps,  and  novels. 

The  collection  of  memoirs  and  historical  books  occupied  a  large 
space  in  the  domain  of  St.  Denis.  From  it,  the  Emperor  usually  drew 
for  his  favourite  reading,  besides  which  he  wanted  it  for  his  personal  work. 
Among  the  number  who  made  contributions  to  the  Longwood  library 
were  two  English  people  of  illustrious  name.  Lord  and  Lady  Holland, 
courageous  admirers  of  the  unhappy  genius,  who  sent  in  1817  a  precious 
parcel  of  books,  which  they  renewed  each  year  until  the  death  of  the 
Emperor.  Other  boxes  of  books  and  pamphlets  were  sent  from  1818  to 
1821  by  the  English  ministry,  and  by  various  other  donors.  And,  when 
the  Emperor  was  obliged  to  give  up  all  work,  when  he  was  confined  to 
bed,  when  he  was  dying,  the  number  of  friendly  parcels  increased.  On 
March  14th,  Napoleon,  during  a  rally  in  his  illness,  opened  for  the  last 
time  a  box  of  books,  which  Lord  Bathurst  had  ordered  to  be  sent  to  St. 
Helena. 

Napoleon,  being  dead,  books  still  continued  to  arrive.  The  last 
boxes,  which  were  received  at  St.  Helena,  fifteen  days  after  the  death  of 
the  consignee,  seem  to  have  been  sent  by  Lady  Holland  on  March  16th, 
1821.  From  1818  to  1821,  during  the  last  phase,  a  relative  abundance 
of  newspapers  succeeded  to  the  what  was  at  first  nearly  a  complete 
scarcity,  and,  on  the  eve  of  his  death,  the  Emperor  was  almost  as  well 
informed  of  that  which  went  on  in  Europe  as  Sir  Hudson  Lowe. 

Without  neglecting  any  of  his  duties  about  the  Emperor,  or  in  the 
ordering  of  his  library,  St.  Denis  did  not  escape  the  matrimonial  epidemic 


42 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

which  raged  at  Longwood.  He  had  discovered  in  Betsy  Hall,  a  pretty- 
girl,  sent  to  St.  Helena  as  a  governess  by  Lady  Jerningham,  the  aunt  of 
Madam  Bertrand,  the  fulfilment  of  his  dream  of  exile,  and  he  was  able, 
with  the  Emperor's  approval,  to  set  up  a  home.  Coming  from  England, 
the  fiancee,  who  was  called  Mary,  or  Marie,  in  the  family  of  St.  Denis, 
was  apparently  a  good  and  simple  girl,  whom  Napoleon  saw,  without 
inconvenience  to  himself,  entering  more  intimately  into  the  little  colony. 
She  presented  her  husband  with  a  baby-girl  to  whom  the  Emperor  deigned 
to  stand  god-father,  and  on  whom  he  bestowed,  on  her  christening-day,  a 
gold  chain  which  is  religiously  preserved  by  her  descendants.  This  was 
one  more  French  subject  at  Longwood,  and  the  prisoner  cheered  himself 
by  caressing  her,  when  she  was  being  carried  in  his  direction.  But,  the 
end  of  the  exile  was  approaching  :  the  Emperor  discontinued  going  out. 
His  malady  made  rapid  progress,  and  was  soon  a  torture.  From  this  time, 
the  library  ceased  to  give  anxiety  to  the  custodian  of  the  books.  No  one 
read  at  Longwood.  A  day  was  preparing  itself  in  history,  in  which  each 
one  sacrificed  himself  in  a  last  exaltation  of  devotion,  praying  or  weeping 
for  the  illustrious  dying. 

After  his  master  had  been  taken  to  the  valley  of  death,  St.  Denis 
with  his  wife  and  little  daughter,  reached  Europe  on  board  the  wretched 
transport  "  Camel  ",  on  which  all  the  exiles  had  taken  their  passage. 

In  his  will,  the  Emperor  had  not  forgotten  the  faithful 
mameluke,  who  had  become  the  guardian  of  the  books  in  his  exile.  In 
different  codicils  he  left  him  a  total  sum  of  135,000  francs,  or  £5,400,  and 
he  charged  him  with  the  care  of  "  400  books  selected  from  his  library 
from  amongst  those  which  he  had  himself  used  ",  and,  "  to  hand  them 
over  to  his  son,  when  he  was  16  years  of  age  ".  This  first  selection  being 
made,  the  exiles,  on  leaving  Longwood,  took  away  with  their  baggage 
the  best  of  the  library,  especially  the  books  from  the  Trianon,  which  were 
bound  with  the  Imperial  arms.  It  is  known  that  those  chosen  for  the 
King  of  Rome  did  not  arrive  at  their  destination.  Of  the  books  given 
into  the  charge  of  St.  Denis,  some  reached  the  Imperial  family,  others 
were  presented  by  their  holder  to  the  town  of  Sens,  whither  he  retired,  and 
where  he  died. 

In  1840,  the  former  librarian  at  Longwood  asked  to  be  allowed  to 
join  the  mission  which  went  with  all  solemnity  to  St.  Helena  to  bring  home 
the  Emperor's  remains,  and  he  participated  in  the  glory  of  the  return. 
Afterwards,  he  retired  to  his  peaceful  home  at  Sens,  with  his  wife  and  three 
daughters,  and  there  he  found  pleasure  in  reading  and  in  the  study  of 
history  and  mathematics.  Some  years  later,  he  busied  himself  in  editing 
carefuUy  his  recollections,  either  from  the  contemporary  notes  of  the 


43 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

captivity,  or  from  his  memory,  which,  however,  he  admitted  in  1847  was 
very  bad  :  but,  it  appears  that  he  was  careful  to  have  it  checked  by  his 
former  comrades. 

The  Council  of  State  on  May  17th,  1853,  considered  a  petition 
addressed  to  it  by  St.  Denis,  asking  for  the  cross  of  the  Legion  of  Honour. 
On  May  19th,  the  Chancellory  of  the  Order,  being  consulted,  replied  that 
the  great  number  of  requests  did  not  permit  it  for  the  time  to  add  the 
name  of  the  old  Imperial  servant.  In  spite  of  this,  shortly  afterwards, 
on  February  23rd,  1854,  St.  Denis  was  decorated.  The  reception  into 
the  Order  of  Ali,  now  a  citizen  of  Sens,  took  place  on  June  10th,  1854,  in 
the  office  of  the  sub-prefect  himself,  Gustave  Lap^rouse,  who  gave  him 
the  accolade  in  the  course  of  an  impressive  little  ceremony,  at  which  some 
old  soldiers  were  present.  On  May  3rd,  1856,  less  than  two  years  after, 
the  former  Imperial  mameluke,  and  the  custodian  of  the  books  of 
Napoleon,  died,  at  the  age  of  68  years.  In  his  holograph  will  of  July  6th, 
1855,  he  showed  his  gratitude  to  the  town  which  had  welcomed  him, 
where  he  had  lived  as  a  peaceful  citizen  waiting  for  the  end  of  his  life,  by 
leaving  to  the  Museum  of  Sens,  besides  certain  works  from  the  library  of 
St.  Helena,  some  precious  relics,  more  fully  described  elsewhere, 
including,  a  uniform  coat  of  the  Emperor  with  the  Epaulettes  and  the 
badge  of  the  Legion  of  Honour,  a  cockade  of  one  of  the  traditional  hats, 
a  piece  of  the  coffin  in  which  the  Emperor  had  been  buried,  and  a  piece 
of  the  trunk  of  one  of  the  willow-trees  which  had  shaded  his  tomb. 

His  three  daughters  were  married.  The  eldest  and  her  children 
died  without  successors  :  and  so  did  the  third.  The  second  daughter  is 
dead,  leaving  a  son  married  without  children,  an  unmarried  daughter, 
and  a  second  daughter  who  had  an  only  daughter  married  to  a  lecturer 
of  the  Faculty  of  letters  in  Paris.  The  child  of  this  union  is  the  great- 
grandson  of  St.  Denis. 


44 


CHAPTER  V. 
MARLBROUGH  S'EN  VA-T-EN  GUERRE. 

rS  this  song  epic,  or  lyric,  poetry  ?  According  to  the  Imperial 
Dictionary,  an  epic  poem,  otherwise  called  heroic,  is  a  poem  which 
narrates  a  story,  real  or  fictitious,  or  partly  both,  representing 
usually  the  achievements  of  some  distinguished  hero  :  a  lyric  poem 
is  poetry  composed  for  musical  recitation,  delineating  the  poet's  own 
thoughts  and  feelings.  It  would  seem,  therefore,  that  it  is  an  epic  poem. 
But,  perhaps,  it  may  be  described  most  accurately  as  a  ballad,  or  narrative 
poem,  adapted  for  singing.  In  any  case,  as  it  was  sung  commonly  by 
the  people,  it  is  certainly  a  folk-song. 

The  song  is  assigned  by  Brewer's  "  Reader's  Handbook  ",  and 
"  Dictionary  of  Phrase  and  Fable  ",  to  the  period  of  the  Crusades.  The 
former  work  notes  that  the  name  appears  in  a  Basque  Pastorale,  and  also 
in  Chansons  de  Geste,  and  from  the  latter  it  appears  that  the  air  was 
known  to  the  Egyptians,  and  to  the  Australian  aborigines  in  the 
eighteenth  century.  See  Notes  and  Queries,  November  30th,  1907, 
page  435.  It  has  no  reference  to  the  first  Duke  of  Marlborough  (1650- 
1722),  although  it  is  considered  usually  to  have  been  sung  about  the  time 
of  the  Battle  of  Malplaquet  (September  11th,  1709),  and  to  have  come 
generally  into  vogue  soon  after  the  birth  of  the  elder  son  of  Louis  XVI. 
(1715-1774),  when  the  young  Dauphin's  nurse  used  to  sing  it  to  her 
charge.  According  to  King's  "  Classical  and  Foreign  Quotations  ", 
page  191,  the  song  refers  to  Charles,  third  Duke  of  Marlborough  (1708- 
1758),  and  his  abortive  expedition  against  Cherbourg  in  1758. 

In  the  "  Illustrated  Book  of  French  Songs  ",  by  the  dramatic  author 
John  Oxenford  (1812-1877),  published  in  1855,  page  187,  is  this  statement  : 
"  the  following  note,  from  their  collection  of  songs,  is  attached  by  MM. 
Dumersan  &  Noel  S<^gur  to  this  song,  the  tune  of  which  is  familiar  to 
many  an  Englishman  who  has  never  heard  or  read  a  line  of  the  words : — 
The  famous  Duke  of  Marlborough  had  been  dead  sixty  years,  when  in 
1781  the  nurse  of  the  Dauphin,  son  of  Louis  XVI.,  sang,  as  she  rocked 
her  Royal  charge,  this  ballad,  the  naive  and  pleasing  air  of  which  made 


46 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

a  considerable  sensation.  M.  de  Chateaubriand  (1768-1848),  who  heard 
the  air  sung  in  the  East,  was  of  opinion  that  it  was  carried  thither  in 
the  time  of  the  crusades.  The  burlesque  words  were  probably  spread 
about  various  provinces  after  the  Battle  of  Malplaquet  by  some  of  the 
soldiers  of  Villars  and  Boufflers  ". 

As  early  as  1706,  verses  were  composed  on  Marlborough,  which  were 
to  be  found  in  the  manuscript  collection  of  historical  songs,  in  forty- 
four  volumes,  made  by  M.  Maurepas,  and  deposited  in  the  Royal  Library. 
The  nurse's  song  became  all  the  rage  at  Versailles,  whence  it  reached 
Paris,  and  was  soon  spread  over  the  whole  of  France.  For  four  or  five 
years  nothing  was  heard  but  the  burthen,  "  Mironton,  Mironton, 
Mirontaine".  The  song  was  printed  upon  fans  and  screens,  with  an 
engraving  representing  the  funeral-procession  of  Marlborough,  the  lady 
on  her  tower,  and  the  page  dressed  in  black,  and  so  on.  This  engraving 
was  imitated  in  all  shapes  and  sizes.  It  circulated  through  the  streets 
and  villages,  and  gave  the  Duke  of  Marlborough  a  more  popular  celebrity 
than  all  his  victories. 

It  is  a  fact  worth  recording,  that  the  song  of  the  page  in  Beaumarchais' 
Comedy,  Le  Mariage  de  Figaro,  was  written  for  this  air.  The  dramatic 
situation  in  which  it  occurs  has  since  been  illustrated  by  the  music  of 
Mozart. 

On  the  cover  of  one  of  several  versions  of  the  song,  in  my  possession, 
is  the  inscription,  "  A  new  invention  for  one  performer,  or  two  performers, 
on  the  same  harpsichord,  or  pianoforte,  or  may  be  sung  by  two  voices. 
La  Chanson  de  mi  Lord  Malbrough  :  from  the  original  copy  sung  by  the 
nurse  of  his  Royal  Highness  the  Dauphin  of  France,  with  the  proper 
French  words,  and  translation  into  English,  and  some  variations  never 
before  printed,   by  Thomas  Carter  ". 

The  old  tune  to  which  the  song  was  sung  bears  a  resemblance  to  the 
airs  of  the  well-known  refrains,  "  For  he's  a  jolly  good  fellow  ",  and 
"  We  won't  go  home  till  morning  "  :  but,  not  of  such  a  character  as  to 
suggest  that  they  are  the  same. 

Everybody  knows  : — 

"  For  he's  a  jolly  good  fellow,  (three  times) 
Which  nobody  can  deny  ". 

Then  come  variations  such  as  the  following  ; — 
"  If  he  docs  he  tells  a  lie,  (twice) 
It's  a  way  we  have  in  the  navy, 
It's  a  way  we  have  in  the  army. 
It's  a  way  we  have  at  (the  'Varsity), 
Which  nobody  can  deny  ".  (or,  "and  so  say  all  of  us"). 


40 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

And  also  : — 

"  We  won't  go  home  till  morning,  (twice) 
We  won't  go  home  till  mor-or-ning, 
Till  daylight  doth  appear  ". 

Elson  in  his  "  Shakespeare  in  Music  ",  page  233,  after  stating  that 
many  of  the  ballads  which  are  well  known  in  England  to-day  have  great 
antiquity,  says  '  For  he's  a  jolly  good  fellow  ',  for  example,  known  in 
America  as  *  We  won't  go  home  till  morning  ',  can  be  traced  through 
the  French  '  Marlbrooke  '  to  the  old  crusader  *  Mambron  ',  and  its 
melody  was  heard  in  Palestine  in  the  twelfth  century.  Oddly  enough 
the  tune  took  root  in  the  East,  and  can  be  heard  to-day  in  many  an 
Oriental  city.  The  fellaheen  of  Egypt  claim  the  tune  as  their  own,  and, 
so  it  is,  if  eight  centuries  of  possession  can  make  it  so.  See  Notes  and 
Queries,  February  22nd,  1908,  page  158. 

In  the  third  volume  of  "  Chants  et  Chansons  populaires  de  la  France, 
Nouvelle  Edition  ....  Librairie  Garnier  fr^res,  1848 ", 
the  first  song  is  "  Mort  et  Convoi  de  I'invincible  Malbrough  ".  Preceding 
it  is  a  notice  by  P.  L.  Jacob,  Bibliophile — "  Paul  Lacroix,  I  believe  ", 
writes  Mr.  Robert  Pierpoint.  He  says  that  "Marlborough"  was  composed 
after  the  Battle  of  Malplaquet,  in  1709,  and  not  after  the  death  of  John 
Churchill,  Duke  of  Marlborough  in  1722.  Jacob  cites,  "  the  ancient 
legend  in  prose  which  accompanies  the  song,  in  which  it  is  said  that 
Malbrough  was  killed  at  the  battle  of  Malplaquet."  He  says  that  the 
Duke  of  Marlborough  in  this  battle  almost  shared  the  fate  of  five  of  his 
lieutenants-general,  who  were  killed  in  the  m^l^e,  and  that  a  report  of 
his  death  having  been  spread  about,  some  waggish  songster  made  this 
song  as  his  funeral-oration  at  Le  Quesnoy  on  the  evening  of  the  battle, 
adding  that  the  Duke's  name  was  the  terror  and  the  admiration  of  the 
soldier.  The  song  was  preserved  by  tradition  only  in  some  provinces, 
brought  there  probably  by  the  soldiers  of  Villars  and  Boufflers,  till  in 
1791  Madame  Poitrine,  the  peasant-nurse  of  the  Dauphin,  used  to  sing 
it  by  the  royal  cradle.  The  Queen,  the  King,  the  Court,  and  the  servants 
at  Versailles  sang  it.  It  spread  all  over  France,  and  became  popular  in 
England. 

Beaumarchais,  in  his  '  Mariage  de  Figaro ',  made  Ch^rubin  sing 
the  air  of  *  Marlbrough  ',  substituting  for  the  old  refrain  '  Mironton, 
mironton,  mirontaine  ',  this  verse,  "  Que  mon  coeur,  que  mon  coeur,  a 
de  peine  !  "  In  London,  a  French  gentleman  wanting  his  driver  to  take 
him  to  Marlborough  Street,  and  having  forgotten  the  name,  sang  the  air 
of    "  Marlbrough  ",    and    the    driver    understood    what    he    wanted. 


47 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

In  April,  1920,  the  Russian  General  Denikin,  then  in  London,  was  asked 
to  write,  in  Roman  characters,  the  name  of  the  British  warship  which 
had  brought  him  part  of  his  journey.  It  was  the  Super-Dreadnought 
Marlborough,  of  the  Battle  of  Jutland  fame,  and  he  wrote — on  French 
lines — Malbarouch. 

In  France,  the  name  was  given  to  fashions,  dress-materials,  styles 
of  hair-dressing,  etc.  It  was  printed  on  screens  and  on  fans,  embroidered 
on  tapestry,  and  furniture,  etc.  Nothing  but  the  fall  of  the  Bastille 
could  stifle  the  echo  of  the  song.  Later,  Napoleon,  notwithstanding 
his  antipathy  to  music,  used  to  hum  or  sing  it  whenever  he  mounted 
his  horse  at  the  beginning  of  a  campaign. 

Jacob  is  inclined  to  believe,  with  Chateaubriand,  that  the  air  was 
probably  sung  by  the  Crusaders  of  Godfrey  de  Bouillon  under  the  walls 
of  Jerusalem.  He  says  that  "  the  Arabs  sing  it,  saying  that  their  ancestors 
learned  it  at  the  Battle  of  Massoure  (query,  Mansurah,  April  5th,  1250), 
where  the  Sire  de  Joinville's  companions-in-arms  repeated  it  as  they 
clashed  their  shields,  and  raised  the  national  war-cry  "  Montjoie 
Saint-Denis  ". 

The  spelling  of  the  name  in  the  song,  and  its  title,  is  "  Marlbrough  ". 
Jacob  uses  that  spelling  when  referring  to  it,  though,  when  naming  the 
Duke,  or  the  street,  he  has  "  Marlborough  ".  See  Notes  and  Queries, 
February  22nd,  1908,  page  158.  And,  as  Le  Petit  Larousse  illustr^ 
states,  son  nom  est  devenu  l^gendaire,  grace  k  la  chanson  burlesque 
dont  il  est  le  h^ros,  sous  le  nom  d^natur^  de  Marlbrough,  thanks  to  the 
song,  the  name  has  become  legendary. 

Gustave  Masson,  in  his  anthology  "  La  Lyre  Fran^aise  ",  who  gives 
the  date  of  the  Marlbrough-song  as  1709,  prints  a  historical  song, 
"  La  Mort  du  Due  de  Guise  ",  referring  probably  to  that  Duke  who  was 
assassinated  by  Poltrot  de  M6t6  in  1563,  beginning  : — 

Qui  veut  oir  chanson  ? 
C'est  du  grand  due  de  Guise, 

Et  bon,  bon,  bon,  bon, 

Di,  dan,  di  dan,  don, 
C'est  du  grand  due  de  Guise. 

And  the  following  note  is  appended  ; — 

"  This  curious  song,  which  we  transcribe  from  M.  Charles  Nisard's 
'  Chansons  populaires  '  (Vol.  I.,  pages  303,  304),  was  originally  published 
in  the  *  Recueil  des  Pieces  interessantes  '  of  La  Place  (Vol.  II.  page  247). 
It  is  remarkably  like  the  famous  dirge  on  Marlborough  ".  See  Notes 
and  Queries,  November  30th,  1907,  page  435. 


48 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

The  following  version  of  the  Marlbrough-song  is  copied  from  "  La 
Lyre  Francaise  "  of  Gustave  Masson.  For  the  sake  of  brevity,  only  the 
first  and  last  stanzas  are  given  in  their  entirety,  the  second  line  in  each 
stanza  being  "  Mironton,  mironton,  mirontaine  ",  which  is  an  imitation 
of  the  sound  of  a  clarion,  made  with  a  hand  placed  before  the  mouth, 
and  the  third  line  being  a  repetition  of  the  first : — 

MORT    ET    CONVOI    DE    L'INVINCIBLE    MARLBROUGH. 

Marlbrough  s'en  va-t-en  guerre, 
Mironton,  mironton,  mirontaine, 
Marlbrough  s'en  va-t-en  guerre, 
Ne  sait  quand  reviendra.' 

II  reviendra  z-^  Paques, 
Ou  h  la  Trinite. 

La  Trinity  se  passe, 
Marlbrough  ne  revient  pas. 

Madame  k  sa  tour  monte, 
Si  haut  qu'eir  pent  monter. 

Elle  apergoit  son  page. 
Tout  de  noir  habille. 

Beau  page,  ah  !  mon  beau  page. 
Quell'  nouvelle  apportez  ? 

Aux  nouvell's  que  j'aporte, 
Vos  beaux  yeux  vont  pleurer. 

Quittez  vos  habits  roses, 
Et  vos  satins  broch^s. 

Monsieur  Marlbrough  est  mort. 
Est  mort  et  enterr^. 

J'l'ai  vu  porter  en  terra, 
Par  quatre  z-officiers. 

L'un  portait  sa  cuirasse, 
L'autre  son  bouclier. 

L'un  portait  son  grand  sabre, 
L'autre  ne  portait  rien. 

A  I'entour  de  sa  tombe, 
Romarins  I'on  planta. 

Sur  la  plus  haute  branche, 
Le  rossignol  chanta. 


49 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

On  vit  voler  son  dme, 
Au  travers  des  lauriers. 

Chacun  mit  ventre  k  terre, 
Et  puis  se  releva. 

Pour  chanter  les  victoires, 
Que  Marlbrough  remporta. 

La  c^r^monie  faite, 
Mironton,  mironton,  mirontaine, 
La  c^r^monie  faite, 
Chacun  s'en  fut  coucher. 

The  song  is  given  by  Monsieur  Gustave  Masson  as  anonymous, 
and  dated  1709. 

There  are  various  editions,  and  that  in  "  Chants  et  Chansons 
Populaires  de  la  France",  published  by  Garnier  fr^res,  contains  the 
following  four  additional  stanzas.  No  doubt,  stanzas  were  added  from 
time  to  time,  temporarily,  after  the  style  of  our  verses  called  Limericks. 

Les  uns  avec  leurs  femmes, 
Et  les  autres  tout  seuls. 

Ce  n'est  pas  qu'il  en  manque, 
Car  j'en  connais  beaucoup. 

Des  blondes  et  des  brunes, 
Et  des  chataign's  aussi. 

J'n'en  dis  pas  davantage, 
Car  en  voila  z-assez. 

In  the  "  Songs  of  France  ",  by  the  late  Father  Prout,  Parish  Priest 
of  Watergrashill,  in  the  County  of  Cork,  a  short  version  of  the  French 
song  is  given,  with  a  very  free  English  translation,  and  it  is  described 
as  "  of  the  lamentable  death  of  the  illustrious  John  Churchill,  which  did 
not  take  place,  by  some  mistake,  but  was  nevertheless  celebrated  ". 
It  is,  however,  scarcely  worth  a  reference. 

I  submit  the  following  translation  of  the  recognised  eighteen  stanzas, 
already  quoted  : — 

MARLBROUGH. 

Gone  to  the  war  is  Marlbrough, 
Mironton,  mironton,  mirontaine, 
Gone  to  the  war  is  Marlbrough, 
Knows  not  when  he  will  return. 


50 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

He  will  return  at  Easter, 
Or  else  at  Trinity. 

But,  Trinity  is  over. 

And  yet  he's  not  come  back. 

Madame  has  climbed  her  turret, 
As  high  as  she  can  climb. 

And  thence  she  sees  her  page-boy, 
In  clothes  of  black  he's  clad. 
My  page,  my  page,  so  handsome, 
What  tidings  dost  thou  bring  ? 

Ah !  Lady !  At  my  tidings. 
Your  lovely  eyes  will  weep. 

Put  off  those  coloured  garments, 
And  also  your  brocades. 

Dead  is  my  Lord  of  Marlbrough, 
He's  dead,  and  in  his  grave. 

Four  officers,  I  saw  them. 
Did  lay  him  in  the  ground. 

His  breastplate  bore  the  first  one, 
The  second  bore  his  shield. 

His  great  sword  bore  the  third  one. 
The  fourth  bore  naught  at  all. 

His  tomb  they  have  surrounded, 
With  plants  of  rose-maree. 

The  nightingale  was  singing. 
Upon  the  topmost  bough. 

And  through  the  laurel-branches. 
We  saw  his  soaring  soul. 

Each  one  to  earth  fell  prostrate, 
And  then  stood  up  again. 

To  sing  about  the  battles. 
Which  Marlbrough  had  won. 

The  ceremony  ended, 
Mironton,  mironton,  mirontaine. 
The  ceremony  ended. 
They  all  went  off  to  bed. 


51 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

The  Breton  peasants  believe  that  the  soul  rises  to  heaven  in  the  form 
of  a  bird.  See  "  Songs  of  old  France  ",  by  Percy  Allen,  page  21.  There 
are  many  references  to  the  song  in  "  Notes  and  Queries  ".  Perhaps  the 
most  useful  are  those  by  Mr.  Robert  Pierpoint,  one  of  my  colleagues 
in  the  House  of  Commons,  the  Member  of  Parliament  for 
Warrington  from  1892  to  1906.  He  alludes  to  the  alleged  Oriental 
origin  of  both  the  words  and  the  tune  in  a  letter  signed  Louis  Creswicke, 
which  appeared  in  the  "  Sunday  Times  "  of  July  1st,  1894,  in  which  the 
writer  gave  the  ' '  original  Arabic  words  written  for  me  by  an  Arab  ", 
or  rather  the  first  stanza  : — 

Mabrook  saffur  lei  harbi 

Ya  lail-ya  lail-ya  laila 
Mabrook  saffur  lei  harbi 

Woo-ela  metta  yerjaa 
Woo-ela  metta  yerja-ya  lail 

Woo-ela  metta  yerjaa. 

In  the  "  Sunday  Times  "  of  August  5th,  1894,  is  a  letter  signed 
H.  Droop  Richmond,  giving  this  translation  of  it  : — 

Mabrook  journeys  to  the  war, 
Ya  lail-ya  lail-ya  laila, 
Mabrook  journeys  to  the  war. 
Who  knows  when  he'll  return  ? 
etc.,  etc. 

As  to  the  second  line,  Mr.  Richmond  says  that  it  "  does  not  appear 
to  have  any  definite  meaning  ".  These  Arabic  words,  however,  prove 
nothing  about  an  Oriental  origin,  as  they  were  supplied  to  Mr.  Creswicke 
some  time  in  the  nineteenth  century.  See  Notes  and  Queries,  December, 
1917,  page  515  et  seq. : 

Fr^d^ric  Masson,  in  "  Napoleon  k  Sainte-Hel^ne  ",  published  in  1912, 
of  which  I  am  the  happy  possessor  of  No.  78  of  the  300  copies  which 
were  printed,  in  the  account  of  the  last  few  days  of  Napoleon  makes 
the  following  statement,  pages  198-200,  relating  to  April  15th,  shortly 
before  the  death  of  Napoleon,  which  occurred  on  Saturday,  May  5th, 
1821  :— 

"  Ce  jour-1^,  lorsque  le  docteur  Arnott  vient  le  voir,  il  lui  parle 
des  g^n^raux  qui  ont  command^  les  armies  anglaises,  et  il  fait  I'eloge  de 
Marborough,  dont  il  a  eu  I'intention  de  commenter  les  campagnes. 
II  demande  au  docteur  Arnott  si  la  bibliotheque  du  20® 
regiment  poss^de  I'histoire  de  ce  g^n^ral.  Arnott  ayant  r^pondu  qu'il 
n'en  est  pas  sAr,  I'Empereur  envoie  Marchand  prendre  I'ouvrage  k  sa 


52 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

bibliothSque.  C'est  un  exemplaire,  reli6  avec  luxe,  de  cette  Histoire  de 
Jean  Churchill,  due  de  Marlborough,  etc.,  etc.,  imprim^e  par  ordre  de  Sa 
Majesty  Imp^riale  (a  Paris,  de  I'lmprimerie  imp6riale,  I'ann^e  1806). 
La  remise  de  ce  livre  provoqua  d'autres  histoires. 
Antommarchi  avait  ri,  et  I'Empereur  I'avait  regard^  d'un  ceil  s6v6re  ; 
il  lui  adressa  le  lendemain  de  vifs  reproches  sur  la  l^geret^  de  son  caract^re. 
Le  docteur  chercha  k  s'excuser  sur  le  souvenir  qu'avait  fait  naitre  en 
lui  une  chanson  avec  laquelleil  avait  et6berc6.  Sur  le  moment  Napoleon 
n'insista  pas.  Pourtant,  il  4tait  peu  vraisemblable  qu'on  chantdt  en 
patois  corse  Malbrouk  s'en  va-t-en  guerre  ". 

[translation]. 

That  day,  April  15th,  1821,  when  Dr.  Arnott  came  to  see  him,  he 
spoke  about  the  Generals  who  had  commanded  the  English  Armies,  and 
he  praised  Marlborough  upon  whose  campaigns  he  had  had  the  intention 
of  writing  a  commentary.  He  asked  Dr.  Arnott  if  the  library  of  the  20th 
Regiment  contained  a  history  of  that  General.  Arnott  having  replied 
that  he  was  not  certain,  the  Emperor  sent  Marchand  to  get  the  work 
from  his  library.  It  was  a  copy,  specially  bound,  of  the  History  of  John 
ChurchUl,  Duke  of  Marlborough,  etc.,  etc.,  etc.,  printed  by  order  of  His 
Imperial  Majesty  at  the  Imperial  Press,  Paris,  in  the  year  1806.  . 
From  the  handing  over  of  that  book  hangs  a  tale.  Dr.  Antommarchi  had 
smiled :  the  Emperor  had  looked  at  him  severely,  and  the  next  day  he  took 
him  to  task  for  his  levity.  The  Doctor  tried  to  excuse  himself  by  pleading 
that  the  gift  had  reminded  him  of  a  song  he  had  heard  in  his  cradle. 
Napoleon  did  not  press  the  point.  It  is  somewhat  probable,  however 
that  the  song  was  in  Corsican  patois  "  Malbrouk  s'en  va-t-en  guerre  " 


The  gift  was,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  Coxe's  "  Life  of  Marlborough  ", 
published  in  1819,  and  the  three  volumes  of  it  are  now  in  the  possession 
of  the  1st  Battalion  of  the  Lancashire  Fusiliers.  Francesco  Antommarchi, 
born  in  Corsica,  was  physician  to  Napoleon,  and  Archibald  Arnott  was 
the  surgeon  to  the  Twentieth  Regiment  of  Foot,  now  the  Lancashire 
Fusiliers,  quartered  at  the  time  at  St.  Helena. 


53 


CHAPTER  VI. 
MARSHAL  SOULT. 

THE  connection  of  the  XX.  Regiment  with  Napoleon  and  St. 
Helena  resulted  in  an  offer  of  hospitality  from  the  Colonel 
and  Officers  when,  like  Marshal  Foch  in  1919,  Marshal  Soult 
paid  a  visit  to  England,  upwards  of  eighty  years  ago,  of  which  a  short 
account  may  not,  at  the  present  moment,  be  without  interest^. 

Nicolas  Jean  de  Dieu  Soult,  Duke  of  Dalmatia,  Marshal  of 
France,  was  born  at  Saint  Amand-la-Bastide  (Tarn),  on  March  29th, 
1769,  the  year  of  the  births  of  Napoleon,  Ney  and  Wellington. 
He  was  of  Hebrew  extraction,  like  some  of  the  other  Napoleonic 
marshals,  such  as  Mass^na,  whose  real  name  was  Manasseh.  In  1804, 
he  was  made  one  of  the  first  Marshals  created  by  Napoleon,  who  con- 
ferred upon  him  also  a  dukedom  for  the  victory  at  Austerlitz,  and  for 
his  services  in  Spain.  In  1838,  he  was  appointed  by  Louis  Philippe 
Ambassador- Extraordinary  at  the  coronation  of  Queen  Victoria.  At  a 
grand  review  held  in  Hyde  Park  on  July  9th,  of  that  year,  as  recorded 
by  the  late  Mr.  John  Sainsbury,  one  of  his  stirrups  broke,  when,  by 
strange  good  luck,  the  Government  saddler  was  able  to  supply  hira  with 
a  pair  which  had  been  worn  by  the  Emperor  Napoleon. 

In  "A  History  of  Our  Own  Times",  Mr.  Justin  McCarthy  says  that 
the  opponent  of  Moore  and  Wellington,  in  the  Peninsula,  and  "  one  of 
the  strong  arms  of  Napoleon  at  Waterloo  ",  was  the  most  conspicuous 
figure  in  the  Coronation  procession,  and  nothing  could  exceed  the 
enthusiasm  with  which  the  white-haired  soldier  was  received  by  the 
crowds  in  the  streets  of  London.  He  appeared  in  the  procession  in  a 
carriage,  the  frame  of  which  had  been  used  on  occasions  of  State  by  some 
of  the  Princes  of  the  House  of  Cond6,  which  he  had  had  decorated 
splendidly  for  the  ceremony.  Soult  felt  very  warmly  the  genuine  kindness 
of  the  reception,  and  became  immediately  a  warm  partisan  of  the 
English  alliance. 

Years  after,  in  a  debate  in  the  French  Chamber,  when  accused  of 
too  much  partiality  for  England,  Marshal  Soult  declared  himself  a  strong 
champion  of  the  alliance,    "  I  fought  the  English  down  to  Toulouse  ", 

^This  chapter  appeared  in  a  condensed  form  in  Baily's  Magazine  for  October,  1919. 
Marshal  Foch,  in  acknowledging  the  receipt  of  a  copy,  wrote  from  Quartier  G^n^ral, 
Commandement  en  Chef  des  Armies  AUifies,  on  October  10th,  1919,  accepting  it  with 
best  thanks — avec  tons  ses  remerciements. 


54 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

he  said,  "  when  I  fired  the  last  cannon  in  defence  of  the  national 
independence  ;  in  the  meantime,  I  have  been  in  London,  and  France 
knows  the  reception  which  I  had  there.  The  English  themselves  cried 
*  Vive  Soult ! ' — they  cried  '  Soult  for  ever  ! '.  I  have  learnt  to  estimate 
them  in  peace,  and  I  repeat  that  I  am  a  warm  partisan  of  the  English 
alliance  ".  Probably  the  cheers  of  the  London  crowd  did  something 
substantial  towards  restoring  the  good  feeling  between  Great  Britain 
and  France. 

The  "  Times  "  of  July,  1838,  frequently  refers  to  grand  banquets, 
balls  and  suppers  in  honour  of  our  visitor,  and  among  names  of  conspicuous 
hosts  are  those  of  Queen  Victoria,  the  Duke  and  Duchess  of  Cambridge, 
the  Duke  of  Wellington,  and  Sir  Robert  and  Lady  Peel. 

Soult  visited  the  Mansion  House,  the  Guildhall,  the  British  Museum, 
the  National  Gallery,  the  Docks,  Windsor,  etc.  Among  other  tours  of 
inspection,  he  made  a  journey  to  the  north,  visiting  between  July  20th 
and  the  24th,  Manchester  and  Liverpool,  the  Menai  Bridge,  Dudley 
Castle,  and  Birmingham.  He  travelled  by  the  newly-opened 
London  and  Birmingham  Railway,  now  the  London  and  North- Western 
Railway,  which  on  April  9th,  1838,  was  opened  between  London  and 
Denbigh  Hall,  a  hamlet  about  two  miles  north  of  Bletchley  Station, 
a  distance  of  about  50  mUes,  and  also  between  Rugby  and  Birmingham, 
a  distance  of  about  30  miles.  Owing  to  the  delay  in  completing  Kilsby 
tunnel  and  Roade  cutting,  that  portion  of  the  line  could  not  be  used 
until  September  17th,  and  coaches  were  run  between  Denbigh  Hall  and 
Rugby,  hundreds  of  horses  being  employed  on  the  work.  The  last  brick 
of  the  Kilsby  tunnel  was  laid  in  June,  1838.  The  first  railway  serving 
the  Metropolis  was  opened  on  December  14th,  1837,  and  by  the  middle 
of  the  forties  London  had  no  fewer  than  ten  termini. 

On  July  20th,  1838,  at  4-30  a.m.,  Soult  with  his  suite,  including  his 
son  the  Marquis  of  Dalmatia,  and  his  son-in-law  the  Marquis  of  Mornay, 
left  Euston  by  special  train  on  his  visit  to  the  North.  Denbigh  Hall 
v/as  reached  in  about  90  minutes,  whence  he  was  driven  by  coach  to 
Rugby,  a  total  distance  of  82|  miles,  arriving  there  at  9  a.m.,  and  break- 
fasting at  the  station. 

On  his  return-journey,  the  Marshal  visited  Birmingham,  and 
neighbouring  towns,  seeing  the  manufacture  of  goods  from  the  raw 
material  to  the  finish,  even  the  manufacture  of  British  guns,  with  the 
efficiency  of  which,  as  the  "  Times  "  remarked,  he  was  already  well 
acquainted.  The  last  place  visited  there  was  the  Town  Hall,  which  was 
packed  with  people,  who  cheered  him  to  the  echo,  while,  among  other 
airs  played  upon  the  organ  was  the  famous  song  of  Marlborough. 


55 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

The  reception  was  followed  by  a  grand  banquet,  at  which,  after  the 
loyal  toasts,  Marshal  Soult,  in  responding  to  that  of  his  health,  said, 
"  the  honours  I  receive  at  this  moment  touch  me  the  more  deeply  and 
sensibly,  because  they  only  confirm  the  opinion  I  had  always  entertained 
of  the  greatness,  the  hospitality,  and  the  magnanimity  of  the  English 
people.  For  many  years  past,  I  have  highly  esteemed  the  British  nation. 
I  have  learned  to  respect  them  in  the  field  of  battle.  I  found  in  your 
great  commander,  the  Duke  of  Wellington,  a  generous  enemy :  although 

we  fought  against  each  other  for  many  years I  feel 

that  there  was  nothing  of  personal  animosity  between  us  in  that  war. 
At  the  present  time,  I  present  myself  to  you  under  a  different  character, 
I  come  as  the  bearer  of  words  of  peace  :  and,  that  peace,  if  my  wishes 
can  accomplish  it,  will  last  eternally.  Henceforward,  there  is  no 
possibility  of  a  war  between  France  and  England." 

A  long  account  of  the  journey  appears  in  the  "  Coventry  Herald 
and  Observer  "  of  the  time. 

I  have  in  my  possession  a  letter  dated  March  15th,  1916,  from  the 
late  Mr.  Theodore  Mark  Wratislaw,  of  11  St.  Andrew's  Street,  Rugby, 
who  died  on  April  5th,  1919,  in  his  eighty-eighth  year,  in  which  he  says 
that  he  was  taken  to  the  station,  being  then  about  six  years  old,  to  see 
the  marshal,  his  mother  being  invited  by  those  in  charge  of  the  arrange- 
ments to  bring  her  silver  tea-pot  to  make  tea  for  him. 

For  information  about  the  Wratislaw  family,  I  am  indebted  to  Mr. 
H.  Lodge  of  Rugby,  F.  White  &  Company's  "  Warwickshire  ",  and 
"  Chapters  from  the  History  of  Rugby  School  "  by  Lieutenant-Colonel 
Sydney  Selfe.  The  Wratislaw  family,  the  title  being  Count  Wratislavia, 
is  descended  from  the  founder  of  the  City  of  Prague,  who  died  A.D. 
697,  and  it  held  the  throne  of  Bohemia  until  A.D.  1310.  Apparently, 
while  the  family  was  on  the  throne  of  Bohemia,  several  Counts  of 
Hapsburgh,  descendants  of  Ethica,  Duke  of  Elsas  (Alsace),  A.D.  700, 
were  their  masters  of  the  horse,  and  from  them  is  descended  the  Earl 
of  Denbigh.  The  two  families  became  refugees  in  England,  and,  strange 
to  relate,  the  Wratislaw  and  Denbigh  families  are  settled  now  side  by  side 
in  the  same  County — after  a  lapse  of  seven  or  eight  centuries,  the 
descendants  of  Kings  as  county-gentlemen,  the  descendants  of  their 
masters  of  the  horse  as  peers  of  the  realm.  The  Count  Wratislaw  of 
about  1705  was  a  friend  of  Marlborough. 

In  the  Officers'  Mess  of  the  1st  Battalion,  the  Lancashire  Fusiliers, 
kept  with  the  three  volumes  of  Coxe's  "  Life  of  Marlborough  ",  which 
Napoleon  gave  to  the  20th  Regiment  at  St.  Helena,  is  the  following  letter 
from  Marshal  Soult,  as  follows  : — 


56 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

Rugeby  (sic),  le  20  Juillet,  1838. 
Monsieur  le  Commandant, 

J'ai  6t6  infiniment  sensible  k  men  passage  k  Weedon,  aux  honneurs 
que  vous  avez  voulu  me  faire  rendre ;  s'il  m'avait  6t6  possible  de  m'arr^ter 
quelques  moments,  j'aurais  6t6  heureux  de  les  passer  avec  vous  et  M" 
les  officiers  sous  vos  ordres. 

Mais,  press^  d'arriver  pour  prendre  le  chemin  de  fer,  je  n'ai  pu 
suspendre  ma  marche. 

Je  saisis  le  premier  instant  dont  je  puis  disposer  pour  vous  t^moigner. 
Monsieur  le  Commandant,  les  regrets  que  j'en  ai  ^prouv^s  et  mes 
remerelments  les  plus  sinc^res. 

Ayez  la  bont^  de  faire  part  de  ma  lettre  h  M"  vos  officiers  en  leur 
exprimant  les  sentiments  de  confraternity  qui  m'animent  pour  I'arm^e 
anglaise, 

Agr^ez,  Monsieur  le  Commandant,  I'assurance  de  ma  consideration 
la  plus  distingu^e. 

M'  Due  de  Dalmatie. 

[translation]. 

Rugby,  July  20th,  1838. 
Monsieur  le  Commandant, 

I  have  appreciated  highly  the  honour  which  you  wished  to  show  me 
on  my  way  to  Weedon.  If  it  had  been  possible  to  stay  for  a  few  moments, 
I  should  have  been  happy  to  have  spent  them  with  you  and  your  officers. 
But,  being  pressed  for  time  to  catch  the  train,  I  could  not  break  my 
journey. 

I  take  the  earliest  opportunity  of  expressing  to  you.  Sir,  the 
regret  I  feel,  and  my  most  sincere  thanks.  Pray  be  so  kind  as  to  com- 
municate my  letter  to  your  officers,  and  at  the  same  time  assure  them  of 
the  friendly  feelings  which  I  entertain  for  the  British  Army. 

Accept,  Monsieur  le  Commandant,  the  assurance  of  my  greatest 
respect. 

(Signed)     M'  Due  de  Dalmatie. 

The  Regiment  had  been  at  the  Tower,  where  it  received  the  Marshal, 
with  other  ambassadors,  and  it  had  gone  from  London  to  Weedon, 
whence  an  invitation  had  been  sent  to  Marshal  Soult  to  visit  the  Colonel 
and  Officers  there. 

Soult  was  Minister  of  War,  and  Minister  of  Foreign  Affairs  under 
Louis  Philippe,  by  whom  he  was  appointed  President  of  the  Council 
in  1839.  In  1848,  when  Louis  Philippe  was  overthrown,  he  became  a 
Republican  :  he  died  in  1851. 


67 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 

The  word  "  Marshal "  is  derived  from  the  old  high  German  Marah, 
a  horse,  and  Scale,  a  servant.  Originally,  he  was  a  manager  of  horses, 
and  then,  as  King's  Marshal,  one  of  the  principal  officers  of  State.  The 
title  of  Field  Marshal  was  adopted  in  England  in  1736. 

When,  on  December  26th,  1916,  General  Joffre  was  appointed  a 
Marshal,  he  became  the  325th  of  the  famous  "  Mar^chaux  de  France". 
A  general  of  supreme  genius,  his  name  will  be  associated  always  with  the 
Battle  of  the  Marne — the  turning-point  in  the  Great  War — and  the 
Battle  of  the  Yser,  whence  he  arose  as  the  Saviour  of  France.  After 
1814,  only  seven  appointments  were  made,  the  last  being  that  of  Marshal 
MacMahon,  President  of  the  French  Republic.  A  similar  appointment 
has  not  been  made  since  1870,  although  an  offer  was  declined  by  General 
Chanzy,  for  the  reason  that  "  the  high  dignity  of  Marechal  should  be 
reserved  for  a  victorious  general,  who  has  had  the  honour  to  com- 
mand in  a  war  of  revenge  ". 

According  to  a  correspondent  in  the  "  Morning  Post  "  for  December 
28th,  1916,  the  post  of  Marechal  dates  back  to  1185,  when  the  function 
of  the  officer  holding  it  was  to  look  after  the  horses  of  his  Prince,  and  the 
word  is  still  used  in  an  analogous  sense  in  the  term  marechal  ferrant, 
or,  shoeing-smith.  The  first  holder  was  Alberic  Clement,  Lord  of  Metz. 
At  the  outset  there  was  only  one  holder  of  the  office,  but  the  number 
gradually  changed,  and  at  the  time  of  the  Revolution  there  were  fifteen, 
or  sixteen.  Marshals.  They  were  suppressed  by  the  Convention  of  1793, 
but  re-established  by  Napoleon  in  1804,  when,  to  be  awarded  the  title, 
it  was  necessary  to  have  won  two  pitched  battles,  or  to  have  captured 
two  fortresses.  The  title  was  then  Marechal  de  I'Empire,  but  this  was 
changed  by  the  Restoration  to  that  of  Marechal  de  France.  In  1839, 
the  statutory  number  of  Marshals  was  six,  with  the  possibility  of  their 
number  being  doubled  in  time  of  war,  and  this  regulation  is  theoretically 
still  in  force.  The  appointment  is  for  life.  There  is  only  one  instance 
of  the  holder  being  deprived  of  his  office,  that  of  Moncey,  who  was 
struck  off  the  list  in  1815,  for  refusing  to  preside  over  the  court-martial 
appointed  to  try  Ney — "  le  brave  des  braves  " — the  bravest  of  the  brave. 

Joffre  fought  as  a  Lieutenant  in  1870.  Later,  he  served  in  the  French 
Colonies,  and  the  Soudan,  as  an  Empire-builder.  In  1911,  he  was  given 
the  supreme  post  of  Commander-in-Chief  in  time  of  War,  and  Chief- 
of-the-Staff  in  time  of  peace,  when  he  spared  no  work  or  trouble  in 
bringing  the  French  Array  into  its  present  wonderful  state  of  efficiency. 


58 


INDEX 


AcTitTM,  battle  of,  12 

Agrippa,  M.  Vipsanius,  12 

Alexander  the  Great,  cameo  of,  14,  15,  16 

Alexandria,  7 

Ali,  Mameluke,  38,  40,  44,  see  St.  Denis 

Allen,  Percy,  Songs  of  Old  France,  52 

Almanach  de  Gotha,  the,  vii. 

Alsace,  Duke  of,  56 

America,  ballads  in,  47 

Anne,  Queen,  11 

Antommarchi,    Dr.,    attends    the    dying 

Napoleon,  v.,  53 
Apres  la  Mart  de    I'Empereur,    Cahuet's, 

iv.,  34 
Arabic     version     of     "  Marlbrough     s'en 

va-t-en  guerre,"  47,  52 
Arnott,  Dr.,  attends  the  dying  Napoleon, 

v.,  4,  5,  10,  52,  53 
Athenaeum,  quoted,  3 
Athill,  Charles  Harold,  Clarenceux  King  of 

Arms,  6 
Augustus,  Emperor,  12 

—  Cameo  of,  14,  16 
Austerlitz,  battle  of,  54 
Australian  aborigines,  45 

Austria   shelters   the   ex-Empress    Marie- 
Louise,  36 
Auxerre,  Marchand  at,  35 
Ayling,  G.  F.,  on  Napoleon's  gift,  7 

Baden,  Stephanie  de  Beauharnais,  Grand 

Duchess  of,  vi. 
Baily's  Magazine,  54  note 
Ballads,  antiquity  of  English,  47 
Barb^-Marbois,  8 
Barbier's     Didionnaire     des     ouvrages 

anonymes,  12 
Basque  Pastorale,  45 
Bathurst,  Lord,  sends  books  to  Napoleon, 

42 
Baudouin,  Maison  E.,  30 
Bauerbach,  Baden,  vi. 
Beauharnais,  Stephanie  de.  Grand  Duchess 

of  Baden,  vi. 
Beaumarchais,  his  Manage  de  Figaro,  46, 

47 
Belle-Poule,  frigate,  37 
Bertrand,  Comte,  as  Grand  Marshal,  2, 

34,  39,  41 

—  command  offered  to,  37 

—  Napoleon  dictates  to,  8 

—  Napoleon's  executor,  36 

—  translates  Coxe's  Life  of  Marlborough,  5 

—  suggests  painting  to  Steuben,  vii. 
Bertrand,  Comtesse,  at  Elba,  39 

—  at  Longwood,  41,  43 

—  attends  the  dying  Napoleon,  v.,  1,  6 


Bertrand,  Mile.,  on  Napoleon's  supposed 

snuff,  18 
Bignon,  M.,  8 

Birmingham,  Marshal  Soult  at,  55 
Bletchley,  55 

Blttcher,  Field-Marshal,  40 
Bohemia,  throne  of,  56 
Boufflers,  General,  46,  47 
Bouillon,  Godfrey  de,  48 
Bourbon  dynasty,  overthrow  of  the,  37 
Brayer,    Lt. -General    le    Comte    de,    his 

command  at  Strasbourg,  and  his  death, 

37 

—  Marchand  marries  the  daughter  of, 
36,  38 

Breton  beliefs,  52 

Brewer's  Reader's  Handbook,  and  Dictionary 

of  Phrase  and  Fable,  45 
British  Museum,  additional  MSS.,  6,  17 

—  Foreign  letters,  17 

—  Lowe  papers  at,  13 

—  Marshal  Soult  visits,  55 

—  Will  of  Napoleon  in,  iv. 
Broadley,     A.     M.,     his     Collectania 

Napoleonica,  10,  13 
Brown,  John,  34 
Brutus,  Marcus,  2 

Buonaparte,  Lewis,  his  handwriting,  8 
Buonaparte,    Lucien,   his   handwriting,   8 
Buonaparte,    Madame    (Madame    Mere) 

pictures  executed  for,  vi. 

—  portraits  of,  14-16 

Cahuet,   Alb^ric,   his   Apres   la   mort   de 

I'Empereur,  quoted,  iv.,  34 
Cambaceres,  8 

Cambridge,  Duke  and  Duchess  of,  55 
Camel,  transport,  43 

Captivite  de  Sainte-Ht'Une,  La,  quoted,  13 
Carter,  Thomas,  46 
Chaboulon,  Fleury  de,  his  Me'moires,  23, 

32,  33 
Chansons  de  Geste,  45 
Chansons  populaires,  Nisard's,  48 
Chants  et  Chansons  populaires  de  France, 

quoted,  47,  50 
Chanzy,  General,  58 

Chaplin,  Dr.  Arnold,  on  Napoleon's  gift,  10 
Charlemagne,  Emperor,  15,  16 
Charles  IV.  of  Spain,  8 
Charlton,  Air-Commodore  L.  E.  O.,  C.B., 

C.M.G.,  D.S.O.,  3 
Chateaubriand,   M.  de  on   "  Marlbrough 

s'en  va-t-en  guerre  ",  46 
Cherbourg,  Expedition  against,  45,  48_ 
Christie,  Manson  &  Woods,  Messrs.,  vii. 
Churchill,  Lady  Anne,  7 


59 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 


Cisalpine  Republic,  the,  14,  16 
Clarence,  H.R.H.  the  Duke  of,  7 
Clement,  Alberic,  Lord  of  Metz,  58 
Clevedon,  Somersetshire,  12 
Compi^gne,  library  at,  40 
Cond6,  House  of,  54 
Connoisseur,  the.  May,  1915,  iv. 
Cornet,  Lucien,  correspondence  with,  23-29 

—  his  Memoires  de  Fleury  de  Chaboulon,  23 
Cornethier,  M.,  32,  33 

Corot,  Alexandre,  Notaire  de  Sens,  25,  26, 

28,  29,  30,  31 
Corsica,  Dr.  Antommarchi  of,  53 
Coubard,  M.,  32,  33 
Coulaincourt,  Grand  Coachman,  38 
Courtauld,  S.  A.,  12 
Coventry  Herald  &  Observer,  56 
Coxe's  Life  of  Marlborough,  inscriptions  in, 

iv.,  3-9,  10-13,  17 

—  Napoleon's  gift  of,  iv.,  3-9,  52,  53 
Creswicke,  Louis,  letter  from,  52 
Crokat,     Captain,     Orderly     Officer     at 

Longwood,  v.,  3 
Crusades,    the,    Air    of    "  Malbrough " 

dated  from,  45-47 
Curzon  of  Kedleston,  Earl,  his  Colledanea 

Napoleonica,  13 

Dalmatia,  Soult,  Duke  of,  visits  England, 

54-57 
Daru,  8 

Denbigh  Hall,  55 
Denbigh,  Earl  of,  his  descent,  56 
Denikin,  General,  on  the  Marlborough,  48 
Desmazi5res,  Edouard,  Marchand's  heir,  38 
De  Ternant,  Andrew,  on  Baron  de  Steuben, 

and  his  picture,  vi.,  vii. 
Dictionary  of  Phrase  and  Fable,  Brewer's,  45 
Dieppe,  presentation  by,  15,  16 
Dino,  Duchess  de,  on  Marchand,  37 
Dorez,     lAon,     on     the     inscription     in 

Napoleon's  gift,  19,  20 
Dudley  Castle,  55 

Dumersan  and  Noel  S6gur,  MM.,  45 
Dutems,  Abbe  J.  F.  H.,  12 

Edwards,  Francis,  on  Napoleon's  gift,  7 
Egypt,  air  of  "  Marlbrough  "  known  in, 
45,  47 

—  Napoleon's  campaign  in,  40 
Elba,  Napoleon  in,  vi.,  34,  39,  40 
Elsas,  Ethica,  Duke  of,  56 
Elson,  his  Shakespeare  in  Music,  47 
Eugene,  Prince,  portraits  of,  14,  16 
Eugenie,  Empress,  her  death,  iii. 

Fattche,  M.,  grandson  of  M.  St.  Denis, 

25-27,  44 
Favorite  La,  convoy-corvette,   37 
Federation  of  Milan,  the,  14,  16 
Fickling,  Birney,  10 
Field-Marshal,  origin  of  term,  58 


Figaro,  quoted,  38 

Firmin-Didot,    Georges,    La   Captivite   de 

St.-H^Vne,  13 
Florence,  Steuben  in,  vi. 
Foch,  Marshal,  visits  England,  54 
Fontainebleau,  hunting  scene,  17,  18 

—  Napoleon  at,  39,  41 

Foreign  Reminiscences  of  Henry  Richard 

Lord  Holland,  7 
"  For  he's  a  jolly  good  fellow  ",46 
Forsyth,  on  Napoleon's  gift,  5 
Fortescue,  Hon.  J.  W.,  10 
Fraser,  Caroline,  becomes  Princess  Murat, 

vii. 
Frederick  the  Great,  portrait  of,  15,  16 

Gambetta,  ministry  of,  38 

Gamier  frSres,  Librairie,  47,  50 

George  IV.,  King,  11 

Gerard,  artist,  vi. 

Gilson,  J. P.,  Egerton  Librarian,  12 

Gorrequer,  Major  Gideon,  Aide-de-Camp 

to  Sir  H.  Lowe,  4,  5 
Gourgaud,  General,  Napoleon  dictates  to, 

vi.,  41 
Granville,  Earl,  7 
Grenoble,  Napoleon's  reception  by  the  7th 

Regiment  at,  vi. 
Guise,  Due  de,  song  of  his  death,  48 

Hall,  Betsy,  marries  St.  Denis,  43 
Hapsburg,  Counts  of,  56 
H6ricy,  Monsieur  d'.  Notary,  26,  27 
Histoire  de  Jean  Churchill,  11,  12 
Holland,  King  of,  portrait  of,  14,  16 
Holland,     Henry     Richard,     Lord,     his 

Foreign  Reminiscences,  7 
Holland,   Lord  and  Lady,  their  gifts  to 

Napoleon,  32,  33,  42 
Horace,  quotations  from,  11 
Hortense,  Queen,  her  necklace,  35,  36 

—  portrait  of,  14,  16 
Hughes-Hughes,  A.,  12 
Hundred  Days,  the,  34,  36,  39 
Hunter,  Major  Thomas,  Montgomery,  12 

Illustrated  Book  of  French  Songs,  quoted,  45 

Imperial  Dictionary,  the,  45 

Italy,  Napoleon's  campaigns  in,  32,  33,  40 

Jackson,  Rev.  E.  Brook,  10 

Jacob,  P.  L.,  quoted,  47,  48 

Jazet,  engraver,  vi. 

Jennings,  Sarah,  7 

Jerningham,  Lady,  43 

Jerusalem,  Crusaders  at,  48 

Joffre,  Marshal,  his  appointment,  58 

Joinville,  Prince  de,  visits  St.  Helena,  37 

Joinville,  Sire  de,  at  Mansurah,  48 

Joseph,  King,  daughters  of,  15,  16 

—  portrait  of,  15,  16 

Josephine,  Empress,  portraits  of,  14,  15, 16 


00 


INDEX 


Jouan,  Gulf  of,  39 
Journal  des  D^bats,  37 
Julius  Caesar,  death  of,  2 

—  medallions  of,  14,  15,  16 
Jutland,  Battle  of,  48 

KiLSBY  tunnel,  56 

King's  Classical  and  Foreign  Quotations,  45 
Elnowles,  Sir  Lees,  correspondence  relating 
to  Napoleon's  gift,  10,  19-31 

Lacroix,  Paul,  quoted,  47 

Ladoga,  Lake  of,  vi 

Laeken,  view  of,  14,  16 

Lancashire     Fusiliers,     the     (late     XX. 

Regiment)     entertain     Marshal    Soult, 

54  57 

—  Napoleon's  gift  to.  iv.,  3-9,  52,  53,  56 
Lane,  John,  his  letter  from  M.  Pichot,  10 
Langlois,     Charles     V.,     Directeur     des 

Archives,  20 

Lap^rouse,  Gustave,  44 

La  Place,  Recueil  des  Pieces  inter essantes,  48 

Larousse  illustrS,  Petit,  quoted,  vi.,  48 

Las  Cases, father  and  son,  act  as  Napoleon's 
Secretaries,  8,  40 

Lef^vre,  Robert,  artist,  vi. 

Legion  d'honneur,  decorations  of  the,  15, 16 

Le  Quesnoy,  47 

Letters  of  Captain  Engelbert  Lutyens,  publica- 
tion of,  iii.,  2,  3 

lAfe  of  Marlborough,  Coxe's,  inscription  in, 
10-18,  19-31 

—  presented  to  the  XX.  Regiment,  iv., 
3-9,  52,  53 

Ligny,  battle  of,  39 

Liverpool,  55 

Livy,  cameo  of,  14,  16 

Lodge,  H.,  56 

Lomer,  Lt.-Colonel  S.  F.  McL,  O.B.E.,  3 

London,  death  of  Princess  Murat  in,  iv.,  vii. 

—  General  Denikin  in,  48 

—  Marlborough  Street,  47 

—  Marshal  Soult  in,  54,  55,  57 
Longwood,  brass  cannons  from,  12 

—  St.  Helena,  Captain  Lutyens,  Orderly 
Officer  at,  iii.  note,  2 

—  hbrary  at,  23,  33,  40-44 

—  routine  at,  40 
Louis  XIV.,  Kmg,  9 

Louis  XVI,  King,  his  son's  lullaby,  45,  47 

—  his  stables,  38 

Louis  Xyill.,  King,  13,  40 
Louis-Philippe,    King,    rewards    the    sup- 
porters of  Napoleon,  37,  54,  57 
Lowe,  Sir  Hudson,  Governor  of  St .  Helena,  42 

—  his  copy  of  Chaboulon's  Memoires,  32, 33 

—  his  treatment  of  Lutyens,  3 

—  papers  relating  to,  12,  13 
Lucan,  Charles,  1st  Earl  of,  7 

Lutyens,  Captain  Engelbert,  as  Orderly 
Officer  at  Longwood,  iii.,  2-5 


Lyons,  Augusta,  daughter  of  the  let  Lord, 

vii. 
Lyre  Franeaise,  La,  Masson's,  48-60 

MacMahon,  Marshal,  58 

Madagascar,  H.M.S.,  7 

Madeira,  Napoleon  at,  41,  42 

Madgett,  author  of  the  Histoire  de  Jtan 

Churchill,  12 
Malmaison,  Napoleon  at,  35,  39,  41 
Malplaquet,  battle  of,  45,  46,  47 
Manchester,  John  Ry lands  Library,  11 

—  Marshal  Soult  at,  55 
Mansurah,  battle  of,  48 
Marcel,  J.  J.,  11 

Marchand,  Louis-Joseph-Narcisse, 
Napoleon's   1st   Valet  de  chambre,   at 
Auxerre,  35 

—  collects  the  Imperial  baggage,  39 

—  his  ennoblement,  36-38 

—  his  handwriting,  9,  10,  13,  19,  20-22 

—  his  souvenirs,  quoted,  v. 

—  Napoleon's  executor,  13-18,  35-38,  62 

—  Napoleon's  relations  with,  1,  2,  34 

—  portraits  of,  iv. 

—  returns  to  St.  Helena,  37 
Marengo,  Battle  of,  15,  16,  35 
Mariage  de   Figaro,  Le,  46,  47 
Marie-Louise,  Empress,  in  Austria,  36 

—  portrait  of,  15,  16 

Marlborough,    John,    1st   Duke   of,   con- 
nection of  song  with,  45-52 
Coxe's  Life  of,  iv.,  3-13,  17,  52 

—  Histoire  de  Jean  Churchill,  11,  12,  63 

—  his  portrait,  12 

—  Napoleon's  admiration  of  4,  5,  52,  63 
Marlborough,  Charles,  3rd  Duke  of,  45 
Marlborough  family,  pedigree  of,  7 
Marlborough,  H.M.S.,  48 
Marlbrough  s'en  va-t-en  guerre,  55 

—  discussion  of  the  song,  45-52 
Mame,  battle  of  the,  58 
Marshal,  origin  and  use  of  term,  68 
Mass^na,  Marshal,  54 

Masson,  Fr6d6ric,  his  Napoleon     Sainte- 
HeUne,  iv.,  11,  34,  52 

—  on  Napoleon's  gift,  11,  21,  22,  52,  53 

—  on  Napoleon's  illness  and  death,  1,  11 

—  on  Napoleon's  library,  41 

—  on  Steuben's  picture,  v. 

Masson,    Gustave,    La    Lyre    Francaite, 

48-50 
Massoure,  battle  of,  48 
Maurepas,  M.,  his  collection  of  historical 

songs,  46 
Mayence,  St.  Denis  in,  39 
McCarthy,   Justin,   History  of  Our  Own 

Times,  quoted,  54 
McLean,  James,  vii. 
Menai  Bridge,  the,  55 
M6i^,  Poltrot  de,  48 
Metz,  Alberic  Clement,  Lord  of,  58 


61 


A    GIFT    OF    NAPOLEON 


Michaut,    Monsieur,    Maltre    de    Con- 
ferences a  la  Sorbonne,  27,  29,  30 
Milan,  Federation  of,  14,  16 
Mindelheim,  11 
Moncey,  General,  58 
Montchemi,  Marquis  de,  13 
Montholon,  Count,  at  St.  Helena,  6,  35,  41 

—  Napoleon's  executor,  35,  36 
Moore,  Sir  John,  54 

Mornay,  Marquis  de,  visits  England,  55 
Morning  Post,  quoted,  58 
Mozart,  "  Le  Mariage  de  Figaro  ",46 
Murat,  Princess  Caroline,  her  copy  of  "  The 

death  of  Napoleon  ",  iv,  vii. 
Murin,  M.,  of  Sens,  32,  33 

Naples,  Queen  of,  portraits  of,  14,  16 
Napoleon    I.,    Emperor,    his    abdication, 
vi.,  39 

—  his  bequests  to  hie  son,  13-18,  36,  43 

—  his  bequests  to  Marchand,  35 

—  his  bequests  to  St.  Denis,  43 

—  his  body  brought  back  to  France,  37, 43 

—  his  death,  iii.-v.,  1,  2,  3,  35,  43 

—  his  death-mask,  vi. 

—  his  decorations,  15,  16,  32,  33,  44 

—  his  dictation,  8,  32,  33 

—  his  gift  of  books  to  the  XX.  Regiment, 
3-9,  52,  53 

—  his  handwriting,  8-10,  32,  33 

—  his  library  at  Longwood,  23,  33,  40-44 

—  his  life  at  Longwood,  34,  40 

—  his  mother,  see  Buonaparte,  Madame. 

—  his  portraits,  vi. 

—  his  relations  with  Marchand,  34,  35 

—  his  supposed  snuff,  18 

—  his  wardrobe,  35 

—  his  will,  iv.,  1,  36,  38,  43 

—  hums     "  Marlbrough     s'en     va-t-en 
guerre,  48 

—  pictures  of,  iv.,  vi. 

—  re-establishes  Marshals,  58 

—  relics  of,  offered  to  Sens  by  St.  Denis, 
32,33 

—  St.  Denis  becomes  personal  attendant 
to,  38,  39 

—  title  of  Emperor  denied  to,  3,  5 

—  unpubUshed  Official  and  Confidential 
Correspondence  of,  19 

Napol'on     d     Sainte-H^lene,     Masson's, 

quoted,  iv.,  11,  34,  52,  53 
Napoleon  in  Exile,  by  Norwood  Young, 

iv.,  vi. 
Napoleon  II.,  bequests  to,  13-18,  35,  36,  37, 

43 

—  his  exile,  1 

—  portraits  of,  iv.,  14,  15,  16 
Napoleon  III.,  Emperor,  his  reign,  iii.,  36, 38 
Ney,  Marshal,  court-martial  of,  58 

—  his  birth,  54 

Nisard,  Charles,  Chansons  populairea,  48 


Norfolk,  Augusta,  Duchess  of,  iv.,  vii. 
Northumberland,  H.M.S.,  40,  41 
Notes  and  Queries,  quoted,  vi.,  45,  47,  48, 
52 

O'Meara,  Dr.,  corrects  Steuben's  picture, 
vii. 

—  his  gift  to  Napoleon,  32,  33 
Ormond,  Lt.-Colonel  H.  V.  S.,  3 
Owen  Glendower,  H.M.S.,  6 

Oxenford,  John,  Illustrated  Book  of  French 
Songs,  45 

Palmerston,  Viscount,  proposes  the  cession 

of  Napoleon's  remains,  37 
Paris,  Archives  Affaires  6trang6res,  13 

—  Archives  Nationales,  20 

—  Bibliotheque  Nationale,  19 

—  Entry  of  the  Allies  into,  39 

—  Marchand  in,  35,  36 

—  Napoleon  in,  34,  39 

—  Napoleon's  burial  in,  37,  38 

—  Steuben  in,  vi. 

—  Tuileries,  38,  39,  40,  41 

—  vogue  of  "  Marlbrough  s'en  va-t-en 
guerre  "  in,  46 

Peel,    Sir    Robert    and    Lady,    entertain 

Soult,  55 
Perrigny,  commune  of,  35 
Persia,  Emperor  of,  15,  16 
Peter    the    Great,    Emperor    of    Russia, 

painting  of,  vi.,  15,  16 
Pichot,  Pierre  Am6d6e,  on  Napoleon's  gift, 

10,  11 
Pierpoint,  Robert,  quoted,  47,  52 
Pius  VII.,  Pope,  14,  15 
Poitrine,  Madame,  47 
Polish  Exile  with  Napoleon,  A,  Watson's,  17 
Polytechnic  School,  command  of  the,  37 
Port6  et  Mercier,  M<^-\,  25 
Portishead,  Clevedon,  12 
Porto-Ferrajo,  Elba,  39,  40 
Portsmouth,  41 

Potsdam,  Frederick  the  Great  at,  15,  16 
Poyntz,  Rt.  Hon.  Stephen,  7 
Prague,  founder  of,  56 
Provost,  M.,  photographer,  24,  30,  31 
Prout,  Father,  his  Songs  ojf  France,  50 
Prud'hon,  artist,  vi. 
Putron,  Lt.-Colonel  C.  de,  3 

Rambouillet,  library  at,  40 
Reader^s  Handbook,  Brewer's,  45 
Record  Office,  the,  Lowe  papers  at,  13 
Red  Cross  Sales,  1915  and  1916,  vii. 
Reichstadt,  Duke  of,  bequests  to,  13-18, 
35-37,  43 

—  his  exile,  1 

—  his  portraits,  iv.,  14-16 
Revolution  of  1830,  37 
Richmond,  H.  Droop,  quoted,  52 
Roade  cutting,  55 


OS 


INDEX 


Rollet,  M.,  letter  from,  26,  27,  28 
Rome,  King  of,  see  Napoleon  II.  or  Duke 

of  Reichstadt. 
Rose,  Dr.  J.  Holland,  10,  13 
Rosebery,    Earl   of,    his   Napoleon's   Last 

Phase,  13 
Roustan,  Mameluke,  38,  39 
Rouveyre,  Edouard,  publisher,  23 
Rugby,  Marshal  Soult  at,  55-57 
Russia,  Napoleon's  campaign  in,  39 
Rylands  Library,  the  John,  11 


Sainsburt,  John,  quoted,  54 

—  The  Napoleon  Museum,  9 
St.  Amand-la-Bastide,  54 
Saint-Denis,  Louis-Etienne,  2nd  Valet  de 

chambre,  as  out-rider,  38 

—  custodian   of   the   library,    1,    20-23, 
40-44 

—  his  career,  38-44 

—  his  death,  44 

—  his  handwriting,  9,  10,  12,  13,  19-33 

—  his  Napoleonic  relics,  25,  29,  30,  32, 
33  43 

—  his  will,  26,  29-33,  44 

—  is  admitted  to  the  Legion  of  Honour,  44 

—  portraits  of,  iv. 

—  returns  to  St.  Helena,  43 
St.  Helena,  Artillery,  12 

—  Hon.  Robert  Spencer  at,  6 

—  Long  wood,  see  under  Longwood 

—  Napoleon's  body  brought  from,  37,  43 

—  Napoleon's  exile  on,  1 

—  Plantation  House,  4 

St.  Petersburg  Academy,  the,  vi. 

Sceaux,  Seine,  27,  29,  30 

Scipio,  Wisdom  of,  14,  15 

Seaton,  R.  C,  on  Napoleon's  gift,  5 

Sedan,  38 

S4gur,  Noel,  45 

Selfe,  Lt.-Col.  Sydney,  Chapters  from  the 

History  of  Rugby  School,  56 
Sens,  correspondence  with  the  Mayor  of, 

22-31 

—  Napoleonic  relics  bequeathed  to,  43,  44 
Shakespeare  in  Music,  Elson's,  quoted,  47 
Sloane,  Life  of  Napoleon  Buonaparte,  iv. 
Smart,  C,  translation  of  Horace,  12 
Smyth,  Major  B.,  O.B.E.,  M.V.O.,  3 
Songs  of  France,  Prout's,  50 

Songs  of  old  France,  Allen's,  52 
Sorbonne,     M.     Michaut,      Maltre     de 

Conferences  a  la,  27,  29,  30 
Soudan,  the,  58 
Soult,  Marshal,  attends  Napoleon's  funeral, 

37 

—  visits  England,  54-57 

Spencer,  Hon.  Robert,  his  gift  to  Napoleon, 

5-7,  11 
Spencer,  John  Spencer,  Ist  Earl,  7,  11 
Spencer,  George  John  Spencer,  2nd  Earl,  7 


Steuben,  Charles,  Baron  de,  his  picture  of 

the  death  of  Napoleon,  iv.-vii. 
Strasbourg,  Marchand  at,  37 
Sunday  Times,  quoted,  52 
Sunderland,  Charles  Spencer,  3rd  Earl  of,  7 
Sutherland,  MilHcent,  Duchess  of,  vii. 

Talleyrand,  on  Napoleon's  dictation,  8 
Ternant,  Andrew  de,  on  Baron  de  Steuben 

and  his  picture,  vi.,  vii. 
Thiers,  M.,  Marchand'e  letter  to,  19 

—  negotiates  for  the  return  of  Napoleon's 
body,  37 

Times,  the,  quoted,  55 

Toulouse,  54 

Trianon,  Napoleon's  Library  at  the,  40,  41, 

43 
Turenne,  Marshal,  portrait  of,  14,  16 
Twentieth     Regiment,     see     Lancashire 

Fusiliers. 

Verger  estate,  the,  35 
Versailles,  "  Marlbrough  "  sung  at,  46,  47 
Victoria,  Queen,  her  friendship  with  John 
Brown,  34 

—  her  coronation  attended  by  Soult,  54, 55 
Vienna,  Empress  Marie-Louise  in,  36 

—  plan  of,  15,  16 
Villars,  General,  46,  47 

Warrington,  Robert  Pierpoint,  M.P.  for, 

52 
Watergrashill,  Co.  Cork,  50 
Waterloo,  battle  of,  book  on,  32,  33,  42 

—  Napoleon  at,  vi.,  38,  39,  54 
Watson,  G.  L.  de  St.  M.,  A  Polish  Exile 

with  Napoleon,  17 
Weedon,  Marshal  Soult  at,  57 
Wellington,  Arthur,  Ist  Duke  of,  his  birth, 

54 

—  entertains  Soult,  55,  56 
Westphalia,  King  and  Queen  of,  portraits 

of,  14,  15 
"  We  won't  go  home  till  morning",  47 
Weygand,  General,  vi.  . 
White,  F.,  &  Company's  Warwickshire,  56 
Whyte-Melville,  G.  J.,  quoted,  12 
WiUiam  IV.,  King,  7 
Willis,  Major,  R.  R.,  V.C,  3 
Windsor,  Marshal  Soult  at,  55 
Wolf,  Henry,  engraving  by,  iv. 
Wood,  D.  T.  Baird,  his  connection  with  St. 

Helena,  12 

—  his  correspondence  with  M.  Langlois,  20 
Wratislaw,  Theodore  Mark,  his  family  and 

recollection  of  Soult,  56 

YoNNE,    Lucien    Cornet,    Senator    of    1', 

23-31 
Young,  Norwood,  his  Napoleon  in  Exile, 

iv.,  vi.,  5 

—  on  Napoleon's  gift,  5,  6,  10,  13 
Yser,  battle  of  the,  58 


68 


Letters  of  Captain  Engelbert  Lutyens 

Orderly  Officer  at  Longwood,  Saint  Helena :  Feb.  1820  to  Nov.  1823 

EDITED  BY 

SIR  LEES  KNOWLES,  Baronet,  C.V.O.,  O.B.E.,  T.D.,  D.L.,  M.A.,  LL.M. 

Crown  Uo.— Price   10/6  Net 

The  present  book,  in  its  appeal  to  Napoleonists,  will  win  at  once  a  great  success.  It  is 
uncommonly  fascinating.  Sir  Lees  Knowles  in  his  short  introduction  is  a  thorough  devotee 
of  Napoleon,  and  his  editing  footnotes  are  excellent.—"  THE  SATURDAY  REVIEW." 

These  letters,  with  all  their  wealth  of  detail,  which  Sir  Lees  Knowles  has  edited  with 
great  care,  must  command  the  attention  of  all  Napoleonic  students. — "  THE  BIRMINGHAM 
MERCURY." 

Full  reason  for  such  an  addition  to  the  great  mass  of  Napoleonic  literature  is  provided 
in  the  new  view  that  may  be  obtained  from  these  letters.  The  manner  in  which  the  letters  have 
been  edited  enhances  the  value  of  the  collection,  and  this  volume  should  go  far  to  increase  the 
reputation  which  its  author  won  with  his  book  on  "  Minden  and  the  Seven  Years'  War." 
This  must  rank  as  a  serious  and  important  contribution  to  the  study  of  the  tragedy  of  St.  Helena. 
— "  THE   LAND   AND   WATER." 

Those  who  are  interested  in  the  "  last  phase  "  controversy  will  welcome  the  publication 
of  these  letters.—"  THE   GLASGOW   HERALD." 

These  letters  constitute  a  valuable  and  important  addition  to  the  history  of  the  St.  Helena 
period  of  Napoleon's  Hfe.  The  book  is  a  valuable  addition  to  the  biography  of  Napoleon,  and 
like  everything  written  concerning  the  most  romantic,  if  not  the  greatest,  figure  in  the  world's 
history,  is  of  absorbing  interest.-"  THE   IRISH   LIFE." 

Unquestionably  a  volume  that  all  lovers  of  Napoleonic  literature  will  cherish.  It  may 
well  be  true,  as  the  author  says,  that  "  during  the  captivity  of  Napoleon  at  St.  Helena  every 
day  is  accounted  for  "  ;  yet  the  fascination  of  Napoleon's  character  and  career  is  enduring, 
and  these  pages,  moreover,  testify  to  the  fact  that  conscientious  and  discriminating  students 
like  Sir  Lees  Knowles  are  enabled,  even  at  this  hour  of  the  day,  to  put  their  hands  upon  fresh 
material.— "  THE  ENGLISH   REVIEW." 

These  letters  are  not  to  be  read  with  pride,  but,  carefully  edited  and  documented,  they  form 
a  notable  addition  to  the  ever-growing  mass  of  Napoleonic  bibliography . — "THE  STANDARD." 

These  letters  have  been  unearthed  by  Sir  Lees  Knowles  from  the  British  Museum 
manuscripts,  and  Sir  Lees  Knowles  has  really  placed  every  student  of  Napoleon  under  an  obliga- 
tion by  persuading  a  publisher  to  issue  them  in  so  handsome  a  form  with  many  illustrations 
in  colours.-"  THE  SPHERE." 

Many  of  the  events  described  are  necessarily  trivial,  for  it  was  Lutyens's  duty  to  report 
everything  ;  but  their  very  homeliness  renders  the  correspondence  all  the  more  entertaining 
to  read.  In  addition  to  the  letters,  the  editor  has  been  fortunate  enough  to  be  able  to  reproduce 
some  excellent  illustrations,  and  the  book  should  certainly  be  included  in  the  library  of  everybody 
who  makes  a  study  of  the  career  of  Napoleon  Bonaparte. — "  THE   FIELD." 

The  most  striking  feature  of  Sir  Lees  Knowles's  interesting  compilation  will  be  found 
in  the  final  chapter,  which  is  entitled  "  The  Death  of  Napoleon."  The  correspondence  has 
unusual  historical  value.—"  THE  LITERARY   DIGEST." 

The  letters  are  full  of  petty  detail,  but  they  are  of  extraordinary  interest,  at  any  rate  to 
those  who  cannot  resist  anything  in  which  the  word  "  Napoleon  "  has  to  be  used.  They  throw 
a  flood  of  light  upon  Hfe  on  the  island  in  the  dreary  months  in  which  the  prisoner  was  moving 
towards  death,  and  the  idiosyncrasies  of  the  people  who  were  waiting  for  his  end  are  unconsciously 
revealed  with  much  minuteness.—"  THE   BIRMINGHAM   POST." 

Captain  Lutyens's  Letters,  as  arranged  by  Sir  Lees,  offer  a  continuous  and  illuminating 
report.— "  SPRINGFIELD   SUNDAY   REPUBLIC." 

Sir  Lees  Knowles  has  edited  an  interesting  collection  of  Letters  written  by  an  Orderly 
Officer  on  duty  at  Longwood,  St.  Helena,  during  the  last  year  and  a  half  of  Napoleon's  life. — 
"  MANCHESTER   GUARDIAN." 

LONDON— JOHN    LANE,    THE   BODLEY    HEAD. 


The    British   in   Capri,    1806-1808 

BY 

SIR  LEES  KNOWLES,  Baronet,  C.V.O.,  O.B.E.,  T.D.,  D.L.,  M.A.,  LL.M. 

Demy  8V0. — Price   IS/-  Net. 

Sir  Lees  Knowles  has  collected  much  interesting  historical  material  in  his  story  of  the 
capture  and  loss  of  Capri  by  the  British  during  the  Napoleonic  wars.  He  has  also  written  a 
delightful  introduction  on  modern  Capri.— "  THE  DAILY   NEWS." 

Little  or  nothing  is  said  in  our  general  histories  of  the  Napoleonic  wars  about  the  occupation 
of  Capri  by  the  British  from  1806  till  the  French  and  ItaUan  forces,  organised  by  Mur at,  at  last 
succeeded  in  persuading  Colonel  Hudson  Lowe  to  surrender  on  favourable  terms,  and  to  march 
out  with  arms  and  baggage  and  with  colours  flying.  Sir  Lees  Knowles's  readable  book  makes 
a  thoroughgoing  investigation  of  the  existing  traces  of  the  history  of  this  occupation,  and 
brings  together  many  letters  of  the  English,  French  and  Italian  leaders  who  were  concerned  in 
it,  along  with  the  English  State  Papers  and  other  remaining  records.  It  makes  interesting 
studies  of  the  personalities  of  the  English  Admiral,  Sir  Sidney  Smith  ;  of  Sir  Richard  Church, 
and  of  Murat  himself  ;  brings  together  a  well-chosen  collection  of  photographic  pictures  to 
illustrate  the  occurrences  referred  to  in  the  letters  and  journals  given  ;  and  reproduces  an 
article  giving  an  excellent  memoir  by  Sir  Lees  Knowles  of  Major  John  Hamill,  an  Irish  Officer, 
who  took  part  in  the  operations,  and  is  buried  in  the  island  ;  while  the  volume's  readable  and 
instructive  introduction  discourses  pleasantly  on  all  the  characteristics  and  attractions  of 
Capri.—"  THE  SCOTSMAN." 

The  interesting  story  that  is  behind  this  is  very  fully  told,  with  many  references  to  official 
documents,  in  the  book  ;  and  it  is  elaborately  illustrated. — "  THE  WESTMINSTER 
GAZETTE." 

The  story  is  told  chiefly  by  contemporary  letters  and  documents,  which  are  pieced  together 
by  an  easy-flowing  narrative.  There  are  numerous  illustrations,  including  admirable  reproduc- 
tions of  several  miniature  portraits.  All  future  visitors  to  the  island  will  be  grateful  to  Sir 
Lees  Knowles  for  his  dehghtful  volume.—"  THE  DAILY  GRAPHIC." 

It  is  more  than  a  merely  historical  work,  for  Sir  Lees  Knowles  knows  Capri  and  its  people 
well,  and  he  writes  intimately  of  both.—"  THE  DAILY   CHRONICLE." 

A  very  interesting  chapter  in  the  story  of  our  old  wars. — "  THE  EVENING   NEWS." 

In  the  interesting  and  attractive  volume  before  us  Sir  Lees  Knowles  has  told  the  story  of 

this  little  episode  in  the  history  of  British  sea  power  in  great  detail. — "  THE  TIMES  " 

LITERARY    SUPPLEMENT. 

The  author's  careful  work  among  official  papers  and  contemporary  records  has  reconstructed 
in  an  attractive  form  the  incidents  of  these  two  years.  Researches  along  some  side-track  of 
history  generally  make  dull  reading,  but  Sir  Lees  Knowles's  introduction  on  Capri  as  it  is 
to-day,  and  the  many  photographs  of  scenes  in  the  island,  lend  the  book  some  of  the  charm 
that  Capri  has  thrown  over  its  visitors  since  a  Roman  emperor  made  it  famous. — "  THE 
MANCHESTER   GUARDIAN." 

Those  who  like  to  wander  in  the  by-ways  of  history  should  make  a  point  of  reading  Sir  Lees 
Knowles's  informing  and  entertaining  volume. — "  THE  BOOKMAN." 

In  a  large  and  handsome  volume.  Sir  Lees  Knowles, Bart.,  has  compiled  a  very  comprehensive 
and  interesting  narrative  that  will  in  the  future  serve  a  useful  historical  purpose.  "  THE 
LIVERPOOL   COURIER." 

Sir  Lees  Knowles  bases  his  story  on  first-hand  authorities  and  evolves  a  very  attractive 
book.—"  THE  OBSERVER." 

This  morning  I  was  agreeably  surprised  on  receiving  your  book,  "  The  British  in  Capri." 
I  have  spent  most  of  the  day  in  reading  it,  and  admiring  the  richness  of  the  documents  which 
are  of  the  greatest  importance  for  the  historical  period  of  our  island,  when  it  was  garrisoned  by 
the  brave  English  military  troops.  I  can  easily  imagine  the  amount  of  work  in  the  researches, 
which  add  enormous  value  to  this  most  valuable  publication. 

DR.   IGNAZIO  CERIO, 
Capri,  April  19th,  1918.  Commendatore. 

LONDON-JOHN  LANE,  THE  BODLEY  HEAD. 


The  War  in  the  Peninsula 

Some  Letters  of  Lieutenant  Robert  Knowles  of  the  7tb,or  Royal,  Fusiliers,  a  Lancashire  Officer 

Arranged  and  Annotated  by 
SIR  LEES  KNOWLES,  Baronet,  C.V.O.,  O.B.E.,  T.D.,  D.L.,  M.A.,  LL.M. 

Demy  8vo. — Prict  Z/&  Net 

The  small  volume  entitled  "  The  War  in  the  Peninsula,"  brings  together  an  interesting 
collection  of  letters  of  a  Lancashire  officer,  Lieutenant  Robert  Knowles,  arranged  and  edited  by 
his  great-great-nephew  Sir  Lees  Knowles,  Bart.—"  THE  SCOTSMAN." 

Letters  written  home  by  a  young  officer,  which,  as  Professor  Oman  says  "contain  not 
only  a  record  of  the  daily  life  of  the  4th  Division,  with  all  the  details  of  its  toils  and  marches, 
but  several  pieces  of  narrative  of  real  historical  value."— "WESTMINSTER  GAZETTE." 

The  interest  in  these  letters  is  derived  from  the  fact  that  their  author  stands  self-revealed 
as  a  singularly  attractive  specimen  of  the  type  of  youth  from  which  the  best  of  our  officers  have 
come.—"  ARMY  &  NAVY  GAZETTE." 


A  Day  with  Corps-Students  in  Germany 

BY 

SIR  LEES  KNOWLES,  Baronet,  C.V.O.,  O.B.E.,  T.D.,  D.L.,  M.A.,  LL.M. 

Royal   SVO.— Price  3/&   Net 

We  in  England  know,  in  reality,  very  little  of  the  true  inwardness  of  the  quaint  and  time- 
honoured  customs  of  the  German  student.  Sir  Lees  Knowles,  therefore,  in  publishing  his 
book  entitled  "  A  Day  with  the  Corps-Students  in  Germany,"  has  done  real  service  in 
describing  pretty  fully  the  life  of  the  German  youth  during  his  student-days  at  Heidelberg 
and  elsewhere.—"  THE  ILLUSTRATED  SPORTING  AND  DRAMATIC  NEWS." 

In  "  A  Day  with  Corps-Students  in  Germany,"  Sir  Lees  Knowles  treats  a  subject  which, 
while  often  touched  upon  in  the  periodical  press,  has  never  before  been  described  with  so  much 
practical  knowledge  and  sympathetic  understanding,  viz.,  fencing  as  practised  in  German 
Universities  and  the  quaint  and  curious  customs  observed  by  members  of  those  academic 
societies  known  as  corps,  which  were  founded  on  a  national  basis.  The  practice  of  Schlaeger- 
fencing,  with  which  Sir  Lees  Knowles  made  himself  familiar  while  in  Germany  ;  the  ceremonious 
procedure  at  a  Mensur,  as  the  student's  duel  is  called  ;  and  practically  every  phase  in  the  daily 
life  of  a  corps-student  are  lucidly  described. — "  THE  FIELD." 


Minden  and  the  Seven  Years'  War 

BY 

SIR  LEES  KNOWLES,  Baronet,  C.V.O.,  O.B.E.,  T.D.,  D.L.,  M.A.,  LL.M. 

Royal  8V0. — Price   3/-  Net 

A  clear  and  well-written  account,  from  a  British  point  of  view,  of  the  famous  battle.  .  . 
Not  the  least  valuable  chapter  is  the  section  devoted  to  a  short  history  of  the  "  Minden 
Regiments."  These  regiments — the  Suflfolks,  the  Lancashire  Fusiliers,  the  Royal  Welsh 
Fusiliers,  the  King's  Own  Scottish  Borderers,  the  Hampshires,  and  the  King'  Own  (Yorkshire 
Light  Infantry) — ^have  won  laurels  on  many  fields  since  Minden,  and  Sir  Lees  Knowles  has  done 
well  to  recount  their  later  deeds.  A  number  of  portraits,  excellently  reproduced,  are  in  keeping 
with  the  well-printed  letterpress  of  this  useful,  if  modestly  brief,  monograph  on  a  vital  period 
of  political  and  military  history.—"  THE    YORKSHIRE    POST." 

A  monograph  of  considerable  value.  Sir  Lees  Knowles's  book  is  well  worth  reading,  as  it 
makes  us  better  acquainted  with  many  episodes  of  this  warlike  period,  and  with  the  men  who 
were  then  most  prominent  in  the  public  eye.— "  THE  ARMY  AND   NAVY  GAZETTE." 

The  book  is  admirably  written,  and  contains  excellent  maps  and  illustrations. — "  THE 
ENGLISH  REVIEW." 


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